


Potentialities and Actualities

by doc_boredom



Category: TWRP | Tupper Ware Remix Party (Band)
Genre: Alternate Selves, Alternate Universe, Anyways, Gen, Multiverse, Parallel Universes, an adventure through space time, danny is a minor character and so are brian and ryan and matt, it's gonna be a good time, mentions of game grumps, mentions of ninja sex party, mentions of supermega, with lots of different TWRPs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-13
Updated: 2018-05-19
Packaged: 2019-05-06 09:07:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 37,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14638620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doc_boredom/pseuds/doc_boredom
Summary: The boys come across a strange item which they later come to know as the Device. It’s purpose? A means to travel between interdimensional space. Too bad they don’t know that when they accidentally activate it, somehow summoning practically every other Sung, Phobos, Meouch, and Havve into their home one night.When their Havve goes missing and another Sung is kidnapped by an evil counterpart to their best robot friend, they must team up with different TWRPs across the span of the multiverse to find them and save the day (again) unaware that another shadowy force gathers on the horizon, intent on changing each universe as they know it.contains TWRP facecanons from the-phantomracer, checkitandbalanceit, and chibitabathaloves on tumblr!





	1. Chapter 1

This was it.

The final battle to end all final battles. The stage was set. There was explosions, there was fire, there was even a guitar solo that went on for a solid two and a half minutes.

There was glory.

There was justice.

There was _high kicks_.

This was his peak. The revelation thrilled through him as the bottom of his shoe connected with General Badness’s jaw. _This is it Sung_ , he thought as time seemed to slow down. Your whole life has been building towards this very moment. The moment in which you finally defeat the ultimate bad guy and help restore peace and love and general grooviness to the galaxy.

And man, was it _epic_.

“Of course I wouldn’t have been able to do it without you guys.” Sung’s saying as he leans forward, hands going to the strap that keeps his pylon in place, shaking out his hair as it comes off. “Phobos, dude, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you play like that before.”

The Lepid is waving him off and while his face is unreadable behind his helmet, Sung can sense how pleased his friend is at the statement. “Aww, don’t get humble on me now.”

“ _Someone in the band needs to be._ ” Phobos signs back before giving a pointed look at Meouch.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean, man?”

_“Means you’re not humble. Weren’t you listening?”_

_Tell them to stop, Sung._ Havve sighs over their link as Meouch’s fur begins to bristle, as Sung feels his general annoyance begin to bleed in to actual anger.

“Hey, guys…” He starts.

Only to be cut off by a heavy groan from underneath him.

The empath perks at that. “Oh, you’re up! Fantastic! How are you feeling, General?”

“Fuck you.” The man says in a low, gravelly voice.

“Gonna say that’s a solid two out ten.” And who could blame him? Still sporting an imprint of Sung’s sneaker upon his cheek and very clearly the loser in the situation. It didn’t help that the empath had taken it upon himself to sit on top of Badness until the Federation finally decided to show up and take him prisoner, either.

And who knows how long that would take.

“The artefacts.” The surprise he feels is immediate, slapping across Sung’s senses as he takes in the room surrounding them. “Where are they?”

“None of your business.” Meouch says sternly at the same time Sung chirps “in our ship!”  
“Sung.” Meouch rubs a paw across his muzzle as they look at one another. “You can’t just be sayin’ shit like that...”

“Well it all is!” Numbers of countless artefacts and strange items from the General’s personal collection and it was all theirs now. “Don’t worry General, we handled it all with love and care.” He pats the man on his shoulder, smiling pleasantly, knowing full well how it will piss Badness off. “I gotta say, you’ve got some _pretty_ cool stuff.”

“You shouldn’t be fooling around with things you don’t understand-!”

The empath leans in and his smile slips, brow creasing over his eye. “So enlighten us.”

The General is opening his mouth but Havve’s moving forward before he can respond, his optics bright and casting the room in a harsh crimson light. _We don’t have time for this. Federation’s arriving in fifteen_ . They had to be up and out of here, _now._

Meouch moves first and Phobos follows him on light as air footsteps. _Stop antagonizing him Sung and let’s_ go _._ The robot says shortly before he’s leaving the room as well. Soon it’s just him and the General left in the large and barren space staring each other down.

“You don’t even get the glory of capturing me.” The older man sighs after a moment. He looks so mundane like this, almost unremarkable in a way. One eye sporting a puckered scar, shortly cropped white hair, a thin mouth. “Does that upset you, Doctor Sung?”

Deep down it did. That was the joy of acting at the universe’s vigilantes though. Not having to answer to anyone meant that sometimes you didn’t get the glory, didn’t get the fame and the recognition. Maybe that’s what possessed him to tell Meouch to grab whatever looked interesting, whatever they could use to remember this day by.

Spoils of war.

The price of victory, as deemed by the winners.

“I’m just glad you’re going straight into the Federation’s maximum security prison.” He stands and eyes the trussed up man. Ten. Ten whole planets that had fallen under Badness’s rule by extension of his army of haters, police states in their own right. There was also the trafficking rings, weapons and bodies alike, and everything _else_ he had done. Every person he had hurt, every life he had ruined, every dream that he had shattered…

This was it.

This _is_ it.

It’s not something in the past. It’s happening right now. “It’s gonna be a real pleasure seeing you be sentenced for your crimes, General.” Sung says in a low voice as he leans in. “Knowing I was the person who put you in there, even if I can’t walk you in myself, is all I need. We won, you lost.”

Badness gives him a thin lipped grime smile and something in Sung wants to hurt him at the sight of it. It doesn’t matter that he’s tied up, that he’s an old and weak man can’t defend himself… He can feel the way his fists curl at his sides as he watches the older male, hating how he can feel the growing smugness that begins to curl off of the fallen General. “I won the moment that first planet pledged its allegiance to me, Doctor.” A dead eyed look slid his way and that grimace grows. “You couldn’t even imagine what other forces are at play-”

Sung can’t help it then. His fist smashes right into Badness’s nose. It’s not just the cartilage either, the bone breaks too with a clear sounding snap as the other falls back. “It was called Ietheon, you piece of shit.” It had a name and a history and people with lives that Badness had simply had seen himself fit to take…!

_Sung._

His head snaps back to the doorway, back towards Havve who’s now standing there. Their link is drawn tight and Sung’s not sure if it’s his doing or the robot’s. _We’re going. Now._

A low breath pushes out of him and he gives one last glance at the General’s unconscious form. He could have been anybody in that moment. Not someone that mattered in the grand scheme of things, not anything like the man that had caused endless years of suffering,

Sung turns his back on him and leaves the past behind him

Towards the future.

Towards something hopefully better and definitely unknown.

 

“Alright. Next up is… this thing.” Meouch holds it up to Havve, slowly turning it back and forth. “My money’s on ‘ancient Earthen bong’, boys.”

“It is _not_ a bong.” Sung says irritably before he’s looking over at his robotic friend. “...Right?”

_Let me actually scan it and I’ll tell you, Sung._

They had decided to wait a whole day until digging through all their newfound treasures on the off chance that Federation would find them and demand why they had taken the items (what, _these_ strange artefacts? We just took them for safekeeping. Please, they’re all yours now, kind Federation folk!) Strange and fascinating finds alike, from vitality scanners to brick shaped communication devices to framed pieces of artwork and pottery pieces from all over the universe. “You know, I’m starting to think he was less of a collector and more of a hoarder.” Sung sighs some, flipping idly through a journal they had picked up, pulling a face at the intimate recollections detailed inside.

Phobos is laughing at that, antennae curling as he wraps his arms around his stomach. Havve’s eyes flicker as his scan ends and Meouch is leaning forward in response, tail swishing back and forth excitedly.

“Tell me it’s a bong, man.”

Sung looks at him desperately and Havve can only stare back silently before he looks back at Meouch and nods once. “YES! PAY UP SUNG.”

“I DIDN’T EVEN PUT ANYTHING ON THE TABLE, YOU ASSHOLE. YOU SAID-!”

“Ahem.” Phobos says in a quiet voice, the one he reserved for when his helmet was off, before he’s placing the next item on the table, grabbing everyone’s attention with it. “Next?”

Somehow Sung manages to snatch it before Meouch’s cat like reflexes can. “What the hell is this thing?”

“Shake Weight.” Meouch supplies and Sung pretends to lob it aggressively at the Leoian before he brings it back up to his eye. It’s a plain black cylinder that’s no longer than his forearm, nothing out of the ordinary about it. “You getting anything from this Havve?” He says as it he holds it out to other.

The robot’s optics scan down the length of it before they dim considerably. A minute passes, then two without any kind of response. Sung feels a nervous chuckle begin to crawl its way up his throat because this is _weird_ , bordering on worrying, if he has to be completely honest with himself. Even Meouch seems to understand that this is strange, his earlier laughter and smile dying as his tail tucks around his stomach, ears pinning nervously in response.

It’s Phobos that finally ends the strange spell that’s fallen over them. He rips the artefact out of Sung’s hands and throws it to the ground, causing Meouch to jump and hiss at it’s sudden and violent clattering before it rolls under the couch. He’s stuck in place, watching where it’s disappeared until the Lepid snaps at him. “Sung.” His voice is sharp as he jerks his head towards the robot.

There’s a soft static that comes with their link and the fact that Sung can still hear that is the only reason he isn’t in a blind panic right now. Still, he can’t get himself to speak the other’s name across it- as if he won’t find anything waiting on the other end if he _does_. “Havve.” He finally manages to croak, hating the cold sweat that’s broken out across his entire body.

 _Oh. That was_ … Thank the gods Havve finally moves, body creaking with it as he shakes his head. _That was unpleasant._

“What the hell was that?” Meouch snarls, his fear and alarm crashing up against Sung, a violent contrast to Havve’s own lack of response and Phobos’s own skittishness. The empath sighs weakly before he glances over at the couch once more.

 _Trouble_. Havve finally supplies, fingers folding under his mouth plate as he leans forward on his elbows.

“Trouble.” Sung repeats back, almost a question, and Havve nods. It was gods damned unremarkable in every sense of the word and yet Sung had _felt_ something in that moment. “...Alright. In the ‘no’ pile it goes then.” The empath goes for lighthearted, forcing a smile on his face as he moves to grab it from under the couch.  

“...Don’t.” Phobos says moments before his fingers graze the surface, causing him to freeze in place. “Leave it.”

“Yeah man, let’s not fuck around with it anymore.” Meouch adds, tail thumping on the floor nervously.

Finally, he glances at Havve. The robot is stiff limbed and wary and oh so quiet.

_They’re right Sung. Just… we’ll handle it tomorrow._

“Okay.” He says softly, casting one last look at it.

Tomorrow.

 

He wakes up with a migraine.

His eye cracks open and the crashing pain is immediate. For a moment he simply just lays in his bed, trying to sort through it. It’s not, he realizes, something to do with nerve endings in his head, or a lack of blood flow to parts of his cerebral cortex.

It has to do with how many people are outside.

Federation. Who else could it be? He’s blindly reaching for his pylon, gritting his teeth against the stabbing pain. The number of people that are in his home is astounding and his core is incessant on taking in every bit of confusion and anger and disarray they have to offer.

Finally, bliss as he pulls on his pylon.

He runs a hand over the bottom part of his face, rubbing the stubble there. He’s gonna have helmet hair for sure today, but he can’t be bothered to take it off again. Why hadn’t anyone woken him up? Was he going to have to greet the Federation and explain himself in his gods damned boxers?

_Havve?_

Radio silence. He must still be offline. What times was it anyways? He’s never been one for comms so instead he peeks blearily over at his digital clock radio on his nightstand. 4 AM.

“You have to be kidding me.” He says under his breath before he’s standing. They can wait, he decides, until he’s gotten a few stretches in and he’s got a shirt on.

He’s struggling to pull the t-shirt down and over his pylon when the knock sounds. It isn’t even a knock so much as it’s a furious pounding bordering on incessant. “Okay, I get it. I’m getting up!” He’s supposed to be the diplomatic one of the group. The golden boy to Meouch’s prickly, to Phobos’s supposed reserved nature and Havve’s strange quiet. Still, he can’t help it. It’s 4 AM and he’s tired and all he wanted was to crawl back into bed and sleep this gods damned migraine off.

“Yeah?” And that’s when everything gets weird.

Because there’s another Sung staring back at him.

  


Phobos wakes up to screaming.

He jerks forward, antennae wriggling as he tries to pinpoint the source of the noise. After everything that had happened earlier he had struggled to fall asleep and it wasn’t quite ready to release it’s hold on him quite yet.

It was strange. They had had some scary moments in the past, but they had always been in the heat of battle, when things had every _right_ to be dangerous and life threatening, but this had been in their own home. How terribly mundane and mortal they had seemed in that moment...

Now the screaming is a chorus.

He doesn’t even waste time pulling on his helmet, instead throwing himself out of his room and down the hallway and that’s when he sees it.

Sees _them_.

He takes a step back because whatever it is that he’s looking at shouldn’t be possible. There were plenty of insane things in his life, things like Leoian’s having nine lives, things like Sung being able to feel what they feel, but then there’s _this_.

“Sung?” He calls out weakly from the railing and ten different people in the room turn to him in response.

Oh gods.

“Phobos.” And there’s his Sung, at least he _thinks_ it the right one... “Dude. Dude holy _shit_ what is happening?!”

“Great question.” Another Sung says, this one strange metallic sheen to his hair and covering his eyes. “Because none of us have a clue.”

“There was a bright light straight out of nowhere and then bam, we’re here!” The third pipes up, a strange scar decorating the left side of his face where his other eye should be, and gods, are those ears sticking up from the crown of his head? Phobos touches his own antennae nervously before he casts his gaze around the rest of the room.

The first pair of eyes he meets belong to another Phobos.

He’s purple skinned and watching the room with a quiet coolness with his four eyes. That’s him, something in him insists, but he knows that it isn’t him either. A Phobos made up of different circumstances.

Gods.

Gods damn.

“What the hell is going on?” Meouch is striding up next to him before he’s giving a spluttered noise of confusion. “What the fuck?”

“Aww, your Meouch has a potty mouth too!” Another Sung says as he looks up, sporting a ridiculous handlebar moustache under his pylon.

“This is getting out of hand.” A man with pale skin and red eyes stalks forward. Havve. That’s a Havve down there that’s actually human in some sense of the word. “Can we all just sit down and figure out what we’re all doing here?”

“Leave it to Havve to be the voice of reason.” A curly haired Meouch snickers. “That’s who you are, right? Cos the whole emo look is really making me think you’re Havvey.”

“...Please do not call me that.” The cyborg says in a deadpan voice.

“Phobos.” He looks up at the Leoian standing next to him, eyes wide. “Is this really happening?”

He’s counting them all but there’s still so many more rooms that they can all be hiding out in and given the decibel level in the house, that’s the exact case. “Infinite.” He finally says on a whisper. There has to be, or there is, infinite versions of themselves out there. Maybe not in the house itself, but _out there_ in the broadest, most fantastical sense of the word.

“IF EVERYONE. COULD JUST LIKE, SIT THE FUCK DOWN FOR A HOT SECOND!” Their Sung is clapping his hands high above his pylon, dipping and weaving between the innumerable bodies. “Don’t even like move just… Stay like this. Please?” He pleads.

 _One Phobos, Two Phobos, Red Phobos, Blue Phobos_. The thought almost causes a shrill giggle to escape him but he’s clenching his hands around the railing instead. Once again his eyes connect with the purple Phobos standing directly beneath them, noticing how the other glances around subtly. He’s looking for something. Probably his friends. His Sung, his Meouch and his Havve. He’s still reeling from the fact that this is really happening. Alternate selves, alternate realities.

“How come there’s like, so many different versions of you and Sung and Havve and then there’s just…” Meouch growls in frustration before he continues again. “Like, why is there just various degrees of cat person for me?”

That was actually a very good question but there’s no time to ponder because Sung’s addressing everyone in the room and probably beyond it as well. “Hello uh… everybody. Welcome to our home. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Meet me? Meet… meet just… everyone here, I suppose.” He sighs and puts his hands on his hips. He’s starting to see some other similarities as well. They’re all the same height in each universe, it appears, and if anyone’s in costume it’s the same across the board, only lacking armor in a few places. “If someone could kindly tell me what the fuck is going on, I’d really appreciate it. In fact, we all would!”

The murmuring sounds like surf crashing in. A Phobos with blue scaled skin is pushing his blonde hair off his face while another is signing frantically to their respective Sung. Did any of them talk like he did? Stilted sentences in a near whisper voice? How many had taken a vow of silence on behalf of their best friend, like he had, only to break it? How many Meouch’s had nine lives like theirs did? How many Sung’s had cores in their chest that read everyone like a book? How many Havve’s had woken up in icy caverns with nothing but hate and fear crammed inside them?

Havve.

“Guys, come on, not all at once!” Sung is practically wailing above the escalating din of voices but Phobos isn’t focusing on that. He’s thinking about Havve, about earlier and about how he doesn’t seem to be here.

Meouch doesn’t even notice when he slips away, slowly making his way towards the robot’s room. He pauses in front of the door, fingers hesitating over the keypad that will grant him access. He’s offline, Phobos. Just let him go for the night, he probably has to recharge after the earlier incident… He rocks back on his heel, shaking his head at himself. He was probably just lost in that huge crowd downstairs.

But then there’s an odd, heavy noise from beyond the door.

Phobos all but falls into the room once he’s keyed in the code and his eyes strain against the darkness, trying their best to adjust, to seek out his friend in the inkyness. “Havve?” He steps in and the door closes behind him. “Are you-?”

The room fills with a heavy red light and suddenly Phobos is face to face with the robot, no more than a few inches between them. Wrong, this is _wrong_.

This isn’t Havve.

His lungs cramp painfully at the knowledge and he barely has time to react when robot’s fist comes flying at him. His body moves for him, some distant memory of his duel with Meouch coming back to the surface in that frantic moment. Don’t think about the pain in your chest, don’t think about how you can barely breathe, don’t think about how one of your best friend’s is probably missing. Survive.

Get out and _survive_.

He dodges again and hears the other crash against the furthest wall, the after image of Havve’s optics seared across his vision. He’s panting now, keening low and helplessly in the back of this throat as the room is painted vermillion. He’s facing the door now, he just had to get to the other said and-

Something whistles through the air, catching in the red light, and he can’t move fast enough for it. The pain registers a moment later and he gives a low gasp. Knife, he had used a knife and he had cut Phobos. It’s shallow but long and races down the front of his chest, spotting the front of his shirt with blue blood. For a moment they both stand there, the Not-Havve unnervingly still with knife still in hand, Phobos shuddering with it.

The door behind the robot slams open with no warning. “What’s going on?” Someone yells before they give a strangled noise as the other Havve pulls them into an unforgiving choke hold. Phobos almost doesn’t see it, the way the robot rips open the front panel of his chest and touches something deep inside. No, he’s too busy making out the shape of whoever is now struggling in the Havve’s arms, slowly realizing who it is...

“Sung!” The scream rips out from him but it’s too late. There’s a bright flash and they’re gone like that. Between one moment and the next and no longer a part of this reality. He can feel the other’s name crawl up his throat again but he’s wheezing now, lungs fluttering painfully. Breathe, he can’t breathe!

“Phobos.” There’s an arm around him, pulling him close. When had he fallen to the floor? When had all the lights been turned on? The corners of his vision are graying out and he can’t focus on who’s standing above him. Another Sung? His Sung? Perhaps the Sung to that earlier Havve… “Meouch, get his helmet. Where’s Havve? Fuck!”

He hears his lungs issue one last weak rattle before the gray bleeds to black and he’s falling into it deep.

 

He’s staring at another version of himself across the table.

This Meouch has hazel eyes and his mane isn’t as wild as his own. Those same strange eyes are running the length of the room as his nostrils flare silently, arms folded across his chest. He can feel his own fur standing up in response, lip curling back. Gods damn it all, how had this happened?

-

 _The conclusion hadn’t been that hard to come to, surprisingly. It had been as simple as tracing their steps back one by one until they had come back to that earlier moment in the day._ _  
_ _The moment where they had touched the artefact._

_“The Device.” An iridescent Sung had supplied, filling the silence that had followed._

_“Device?” Sung (their Sung, he supposed) questioned back. Quite a few others were speaking then, giving their own accounts in response. A strange item that some had merely stumbled upon in their intergalactic travels, others explaining that they had spent years looking for this thing of myth. It’s purpose? That’s when everyone got a cross look on their face, a silence settling over them once more. Indiscernible, apparently. And yet despite finding something that seemingly didn’t serve any purpose, no one had been able to part ways with it. Or, Meouch’s favorite, they had…_

_...And it had found its way back to them._

_He had given a heavy sigh because this wasn’t his forte. He liked the straight forward shit, none of this Fates driven garbage that was beyond his own control. It was already hard enough accepting that his kind had nine lives as is, but now there was alternate realities and parallel universes and mystery bullshit technology? Not to mention the fact that there was currently multiple Sung’s in this household and one was already pushing it as is._

_“They must be all connected somehow.” Their Sung had said softly, scratching at his pylon in thought. “We called you here apparently, but the response wasn’t immediate… Did anybody physically interact with their Device before they showed up here?”_

_Every head had shook itself in furious denial. Nothing could be easy, could it? Sung’s still charging though, apparently on some thought train that Meouch couldn’t even begin to catch up to. “But clearly… there should be more of us, because multiverse theory states that the included universes in it…”_

_“Compromise everything that exists! Space, time, matter, energy, physical laws…” The same Sung from before had stepped forward, a smile on his face as their voices overlapped._

_“Constants!”_

_“Gods…” Meouch had groaned, slapping a hand over his muzzle. What a bunch of nerds. But there was no time to say as such because they were already both yapping excitedly._

_“So there must be other versions of us who haven’t found their Device, or activated it. That’s why there’s so many, but not literally everybody ever!”_

_“So technically anyone could have done what you did so long as they activated their Device-”_

_“Meaning you should all be able to use yours to get back home!” A pause. “You know, once we figure it out, and we will, because we’re awesome like that.”_

_They had slapped their hands together in an impressive high five, wearing matching smiles, although Meouch noted the other Sung had a gap between his two front teeth. “Great job, Doctor Sung.” He had said then, causing their Sung to give a hearty laugh as he waved him off._

_“Oh no, thank you Doctor Sung, you’re so smart!”_

_“Well, you’re so handsome!”_

_“No no no. Listen, you’re the talented one here!”_

_“Talented! I’ll have you know-”_

_“Only Sung…” A purple Phobos with pointed ears had sighed under his breath, but he had a hint of a smile touching his lips, a knowing look about him._

_“Now the question stands… does everyone have their Device with them?” And there they were, being held up high in the air by various Phobos’s and Havve’s and Sung’s and Meouch’s across the room. “Well shit! Let’s get you home!”_

_“You know, one of these days we’ll actually all have to get together and inspect this more.” A similarly pyloned Sung had said as he steps forward, stroking the moustache above his lip. “Since, you know, the universe hasn’t torn itself apart.”_

_“That’s always a plus!” Their Sung had laughed easily then, like this wasn’t the craziest thing to ever happen to them, like this was just a normal day routine like brushing your teeth or checking through your messages. “I’d love to. Hell, I’d just like to come visit another universe. This is crazy.”_

_“Absolutely!”_

_“Well count me out.” Meouch had huffed, his tail waving unenthusiastically. “This has been the weirdest most confusing night of my life.”_

_It was about to get worse, apparently._

_They had sent just about everyone home at that point. His eyes were getting heavy and the need to sleep was creeping back up on him again. All that was left was the strange shining Sung from before and his crew, the purple Phobos apparently a part of it._

_“Aww, what’s wrong Meouch?” Sung had turned to him, an over exaggerated frown on his features. “Sad to see all our new friends go?”_

_“Well I’m just a little pissed that the most variety I got was a girl version of myself.” He had muttered sourly in response, tail flicking back and forth impatiently. The other Meouch had raised a brow at him and he could feel his own expression becoming cross in response. “What? Like you didn’t want to see someone who wasn’t a cat alien!”_

_“I didn’t say anything.” The other him drawled and Meouch felt himself bristle in response, paw raised and index finger extended, a rant moments from escaping him._

_“Hey, hey now fellas. There’s no need to have a…” Other Sung pauses and a small laugh slips out of him. “...A k-kuh...cat fight.”_

_“OH!” Their Sung had rocked forward with a spluttering laugh. “CAT FIGHT! THAT’S SO GOOD!”_

_The other Phobos had quickly brought a hand to his mouth, but there was no denying the amused snort the other issued in response. They both stared at each other then, mouths hanging open in disbelief._

_“Oh fuck off with that right now, Sung.” The other snapped. “And you...” He turned to other Havve. “Don’t even-”_

_“I wouldn’t want to get involved in such a cat-astrophe anyways.” He said easily from behind his mask and both Sung’s were really whooping in laughter at that, slapping each other on the back._

_“Fuck your friends.” Meouch noted and the other gave a quick snap of his tail in response._

_“Yours aren’t any better.”_

_“What do you mean, we’re gr-” Their Sung was saying only to be cut off by a loud crashing noise. “What the hell?” His hand went up to unstrap his pylon but the other Sung had reacted first, already racing up the stairs. “H-hey!”_

_“That’s kind of his thing.” The other Phobos noted but now the other Meouch was sniffing at the air and his four eyes were narrowing. “What?”_

_“Trouble.” He had growled out. By now Sung finally had his pylon off and his eye was widening as the brunt of whatever it was hit him in full._

_“Hey, what?” But now he was racing up the stairs as well. “Sung! Gods damn it, you can’t just-” He snarled._

_“SUNG!”_

_That was Phobos screaming,_ their _Phobos, the name tearing out of him in a terrified shriek. The Lepid never spoke above a gentle murmur, words always tempered by a softness that none of them could ever match even when he spoke harshly._

_What the hell was going on?_

_He took the stairs two at a time until he had reached the pure chaos that had become Havve’s room. The smell of blood had hit him first, his nose curling away from it. He saw it then, Phobos on the floor, mouth working like a dying fish, huge eyes trained on the ceiling above. Sung’s screamed something at him and all he could do is stand there, brain trying to catch up, trying to make sense of everything._

_“Meouch!” Sung had barked, startling him out of his reverie. “Helmet, now.”_

_He finally forced himself to move, shoving past everyone else and down the hall. Thank the gods that Phobos was a creature of habit, making it all too easy to find his helmet on the dresser. Somehow in his panic he had found his way back, the helmet almost falling from his sweaty grip as he approaches Sung once more._

_“Is he…?” The other Meouch said, breaking the silence that followed as Sung help fit the helmet over Phobos’s head, snapping the lock into place with a terrible gentleness._

_“...That’s my fault.” He said in a soft voice. “I don’t know what happened in your universe, but we burned his planet to the ground, he’s… he’s had lung problems since.” He had closed his eyes against the memories then, the ghost of Funk thrumming through his veins, causing his pulse to skip dangerously. “He’ll be okay. Sung retrofitted his helmet to act as a respirator.”_

_“Shit.” The other had breathed out in response._

_At some point Sung had sat back, a low breath pushing out of him, his skin pale as he announced that Phobos had fainted. “He’ll be okay though.” Sung murmured, pushing his hair back from his face. “The cut is only superficial and it already clotted over, so he should be… he should be fine.”_

_“So what the hell was that?” Meouch said. “And where’s Havve?”_

_“And our Sung?” The other Phobos said before his eyes had cut down to their Phobos on the ground._

_Sung then, finally pulling himself together. “...We’re going to have to wait to find out.”_

 

So _that’s_ how he finds himself stuck with other Phobos and other Havve and other Meouch, the three of them on the opposite side of the table while he’s just sitting there, feeling like absolute garbage. Sleep deprived with worry threading its way through his mind alongside memories of the past. Gods, he could use a cigarette. He glances up at the other version of himself, ears perking hopefully. “Gotta light?”

“Sorry man, I don’t.” At least he isn’t an asshole about it. He sighs and slumps back, glancing up the stairs once more. Havve missing and the other Sung too, and Phobos bleeding out on the floor? None of that made for anything good, that was for sure.

“Can you not link up with your Sung?” He’s saying to the other Havve, brow raising in question. He shakes his head, still wearing his mask, dark hands folded on top of the table. “Gods, this is weird. Is this weird? Am I _making_ it weird?”

“Just a little.” Phobos says in a sharp voice before he’s closing his lower eyes, sighing softly. “Sorry, it’s just… it’s a lot right now.”

“You’re telling me.”

They all turn then to see Sung standing at the top of the stairs with Phobos on his arm. The Lepid looks wrecked, antennae drooping and leaned up against the empath with an unfocused expression. “You sure you wanna…?” He’s adjusting his grip and the other nods. “Alright, here we go, nice and slow now.”

The other Phobos is watching as they come down and it’s so strange. He was able to see the similarities between Sung and his counterpart, himself and the other Meouch, hell even both Havve’s seemed somewhat similar so far, but then there was this Phobos… There was something cool and distant about him, something that their Phobos would never be able emulate. “Hi…” Their Phobos said in that small voice of his, a tired smile pulling at his mouth. “...Sorry…”

“Why are you apologizing Phobs!” Sung just about yells at the other before he’s catching himself, jaw clenching. “Dude... c’mon.”

“I...I let that happen.” His voice goes tight at the end and everyone’s leaning forward, eyeing him expectantly. “H-Havve...No. Not Havve…”

“Not Havve?” Meouch prompts. It happened more often than not, Phobos’s sentences tapering off, leading nowhere. The Lepid raises his hands, glancing over at Sung before the cyclops gives an encouraging nod.

“I’m gonna translate for Phobs.” And just like that the other begins to sign. “Uh… so Phobos realized that our Havve wasn’t anywhere obvious, so he went to go check up on him.” Phobos nods before he’s signing faster. “He went in his room after hearing something and just… it was dark? Yeah, dark. And then Havve was there but it wasn’t him and he was… he attacked him.” Sung hesitates, eye rounding. “T-that’s when your Sung appeared, and then he took him.”

“Took him where?” The other Phobos’s eyes narrow and Meouch is this close to really smacking the other when their Phobos leans forward in response.

“There was a bright light.” He says in a low voice. “And then they were _gone_.”

“Holy shit, they’re in another universe, aren’t they?” The other Meouch says and he knows the other is recalling how they sent everyone back earlier, the bright flash that had filled the space of their home time and time again.

“Well... “ Sung’s forcing a smile. “Looks like we get to see our new friends sooner than we thought.”


	2. Chapter 2

“So, where do we start?” 

They’re all staring at the Device on the floor, all their heads nearly touching one another as they lean over it. “Well, you gotta just pick it up to start.” Meouch offers and Sung pushes him. “Hey!” 

“No fighting.” Phobos says, antennae twitching, a smirk of dry amusement spreading across his features.

“I have to agree.” The other Phobos says as he leans down, taking the Device into his right hand. “You just have to twist it, right?” A simple flick of his wrist and a blue light begins to seep out through the gap. Sung starts forward, swiping it from the other without warning. “I was just-”

“Bad!” The cyclops chastises as he cradles it close. “You need to be careful with this. We can’t be chasing after you too, purple Phobos. Probos? Purbos? ...PP…?” A pause, the other Phobos’s face going slack with shock. “NO WAIT, I TAKE THAT ONE BACK.”

“I am… so sorry…” Meouch says as he brings the other into a casual headlock, purposely ignoring his struggle. “He’s kind of the worst.”

“He’s like our Sung, but times ten…” The other Havve notes dryly. “May I?” 

Sung huffs and finally squirrels his way out of the other’s grip before he’s handing it over. Another universe, they were going to another universe. If not for the fact that one of his best friends was missing, that another him is also lost somewhere out there, this would almost be exciting.

Hell, who was he kidding? This is one of the most amazing things to ever happen in his  _ entire _ life. 

The other Havve is careful as he continues to unlock the device, face completely unreadable from behind that eerily similar mask of his. What made some things the same and some things different? He’s squinting against the blinding light, eye squeezing itself tight as he turns away. “I’m going to assume we’re going to end up in whatever universe this is from...” 

“And what if it’s from this one?” Meouch is shielding his eyes, lip pulled back to show off his fangs. It very well could be given that it was from the General’s treasure trove. 

“I highly doubt that, but we’ll go from there. There has to be a way to calibrate it in order to travel to another universe, it may just take some time.”

“We don’t have time.” The other Phobos hisses. “Sung’s missing, Havve.”

“And  _ our _ Havve, too.” Meouch reminds him, none too kindly. “We’re in this together, yeah? We have just as much of a stake in this as you do.”

He’s exhaling through his nose and folding his arms across his chest, all four eyes averting from the Device. He doesn’t need his pylon off to tell that the other was upset, that he didn’t want to be here at all. A long way from home, he can’t help but think, and then he feels it.

The pull.

There’s no better way of describing it. Like something was tugging his entire being forward, out into the unknown. A giddy smile spreads across his features and he’s grabbing at Meouch and Phobos, hands clasping their upper arms. “This is it.” He exhales. Phobos is grabbing the other Phobos and in turn, he’s grabbing Havve and Meouch completes the circle. 

And just like that they’re  _ gone _ .

His eye opens up to a gray sky.

It takes a moment for him to register that he’s laying on the ground. He pats his front, fingers taking inventory of the armor he slipped into earlier, of his core (warm and whole in his chest, covered in part by his chest plate) and of everything else he ought to have. Nothing missing, at least. Not even the ‘chucks in his hip bag or those snacks he had totally forgotten about.

“You gonna stay down there all day?” He looks to see his Meouch, hands on hips, eyebrows drawn together over his tawny eyes. 

“Help me up and I won’t have to.” He smiles at the other then, feeling it grow as he sees Meouch’s whiskers twitch in amusement. “You know, you  _ can _ smile, there’s nothing saying you can’t.”

“Shut up.” Meouch says fondly and Sung’s grabbing his paw, letting the other heft him with a ridiculous ease. “So, we all just came to about five minutes ago. Other Havve’s been trying to get a read on where we are but there’s jack shit so far.” 

It’s cold, the kind that’s defined by its crispness, accented by the perpetual span of gray above them. “Well, this place blows.” Sung says simply. They already got a lot of comments for their outfit choices and here they were, sticking out like real sore thumbs in the middle all this bleakness. “I’m gonna take my pylon off, try and get a read…”

“You do that.” He taught them all to put up walls but it helps when there’s distance between him and them. He’s sitting again, more gray underneath him, the rock hard and unforgiving and for a moment he hesitates, his fingers grazing the clasp. Earlier, he had sensed Havve  _ earlier _ , right? That radio silence that had stretched between his room and the robot’s hadn’t been out of the ordinary whatsoever, it was something that always happened when Havve went offline.

So why…

“Sung?” A hand on his shoulder, drawing him back physically and mentally. He sees Phobos then, eyes wide and unblinking. “You okay?”

“Y-Yeah, I was just… I was thinking about Havve. I should have known something was up earlier. I checked in on him, at least I thought I did.” There was too much distance now to try and reach across their link. 

It would be like calling out into the void.

“He’ll be okay.” Phobos says it with such certainty that Sung almost has to believe him. “You would know.” Shared thoughts, shared pain. There wasn’t much that was secret between him and Havve when it came down to it, so it should be easy to accept the other’s answer, but there’s still something in him that struggles to believe, that  _ doubts _ .

“I’m gonna… I’m gonna see what I can get a sense on anything, yeah? I mean it this time.” He tacks on the last part when Phobos gives him a pointed look. “Tell Meouch to stop worrying.”

“Not just Meouch.” Phobos murmurs, touching his shoulder once more before walking away. “Be careful.” He throws over his shoulder.

“Always.” He gives a half grin before undoing the strap.

For a moment all he can sense is the other Havve and Phobos and Meouch. He’s looking beyond the mix of fear and worry the emanate, beyond them. Beyond the outcropping that they’re currently located on, out as far as his core will reach. 

Nothing.

There was absolutely nothing. 

The breath chokes out of him because it’s been ages since he’s felt something like this. Even then it wasn’t in full. It was something perishing then, something wasting away slowly until  _ nothing _ was left.

It had been something dying then.

He’s forcing himself up and stalking over to the group, fingers shaking as they go to pull on his pylon again. “We need to go. Now.”

“What, why? We just go here!” The other Meouch is insisting. “I haven’t even got a chance to scent anything-”

“That’s the thing. There’s nothing here. It’s all  _ dead _ .” He bites out the last word, hissing when he manages to catch some of his skin in the pylon’s clasp. “Whatever it was, is? It’s this universe’s Ennui. It went and killed everything here and we can’t be here, okay?”

“Ennui?” The other Phobos murmurs in question, brows raising in confusion. “What’s that?”

“It means a feeling of listlessness, dissatisfaction from lack of occupation or excitement.” Havve says, his voice very quiet in that moment and Sung has to clamp his lips together not to scream at the other that he  _ knew _ that. That he had looked up every definition and every synonym and variation of the gods damned word and it still meant the same thing at the end of the day. 

It meant death.

“Can we get a translation, please?” The other Meouch says and there’s no time, no gods damn time to talk about it because he feels sick and he can’t be here and-

“Boredom. It means boredom, okay?” His Meouch is snarling in response and just like that they _ know. _ Havve’s already bringing out the Device and the other Meouch is moving closer, putting a hand on his shoulder. 

“Our Sung had the same thing happen too.” He’s saying in a gentle voice. “We’re going to get out of here, okay? It’s just going to take a moment while Havve figures it out.”

Death by boredom. Did it go fast for their Sung’s planet, or was it the same drawn out process that he had experienced and had nearly succumbed to? Both Meouch’s are saying something to him (at him) and all he can do is stand there dumbly, his eye trained on the ground from behind his visor. 

Was there even a Sung in this universe? What about a Phobos or a Havve or Meouch? This was just one planet, but out there there could be  _ anything _ . Or there could be  _ nothing _ , something in him insists darkly. A dead universe with nothing but dying stars sighing out of existence, stagnant worlds in which nothing would ever walk or think or exist ever again.

“Anywhere. Literally anywhere but here, just make it happen!” Everyone’s yelling around and he’s closing his eye, shuddering softly, desperately…

_ Havve. _

_...Sung? _

His head snaps up, mouth falling open, but it’s too late. He feels the pull again and they’re going, going…

_ Gone _ .

 

Phobos is standing up when they arrive in the next universe.

Gods, it’s dry here. He tries not to inhale too deeply as he removes his helmet, head moving back and forth. There’s the other Phobos, eyes narrowed against the sunlight above head, and the other Havve is pulling his face mask away, revealing a dark complexion and heavily lidded red eyes. Huh, that was interesting, but what about the Meouch’s and Sung?

They’re still surrounding the empath, their ears tucked low as they lean in towards him. He’s saying something and they’re both staring at him helplessly until he raises his voice, the words practically shouting out of him. 

“We have to go back!”

“You wanted us to leave, why would we go back there?” The other Phobos says, whipping around so fast his ponytail almost hits him in the face. Phobos is taking his own cautious step forward then, antennae jumping in response to the urgency of the situation. 

“No fighting, please…” He’s saying in a soft voice but of  _ course _ none of them can hear him. Typical. “...Everyone…”

“Because I heard Havve back there! He’s  _ back _ there! Please!” Sung’s throws himself at the other Phobos then, apparently not caring as the other squawks in response, trying to shove him away. “Please let me go back, just to make sure.”

“You’re not going alone!” Meouch says as he curls a claw into Sung’s suit, dragging him back a few inches. “Gods, man, c’mon! Take a deep breath!”

“We’re not going anywhere until we get this damn thing figured out, much less that dead ‘verse.” The other Phobos says sternly. Maybe that would have gone over well with the other Sung, but this is  _ their  _ Sung. Impulsive, energetic, wildly off the walls and completely unapologetic for his very existence and very clearly  _ pissed _ .

“Gods, fuck you.” Sung says before he’s stomping off. For a moment they all stand there before Phobos begins to run after him. This isn’t just a foreign world, this is a foreign  _ universe _ . Who knew what was waiting for them out there? At least he feels life here. The other planet had been just as the other Phobos had said: dead. There was no coming back from that. 

Whatever had done that was permanent.

Leaving his helmet behind is a mistake he realizes sooner rather than later. He’s panting in short little breaths by the time he reaches Sung, his lungs aching from it. The empath hears him approaching and whips around, his mouth set into a thin line under his visor. “Oh…” It wavers before it turns down at the corners, turning itself into a full on frown. “Phobos. It’s you.”

The doesn’t mean the same thing it meant just an hour ago, did it?

“The one and only.” He tries to joke but Sung’s frown deepens that much more. “S-sorry…”

“No, it’s okay, I’m just… this has all been a lot.” He’s placing his pylon under his arm, glancing around curiously. “I don’t even know where the hell we are.” 

“Somewhere better.” He’s leaning down to catch his breath while he touches the soil at their feet. Dry at first, but as he digs his fingers in further he begins to feel a damp coolness. “Arid, desert climate.” Lepid’s had their fair amount of experience with growing all things, so the earth had always been a friend of his. “Tough.”

“Tough?” Sung echoes back and Phobos is nodding.

“Resilient.” That’s the better word for it. Things that adapted to survive, that could thrive on stored nutrients and supplies. “Strong.”

Sung’s frown is fading and something like a smile is returning to his features. There’s the Sung they knew and loved. Phobos stands up then, his own mouth pulling into a small smile as he brushes the soil from his hands. “Regroup?”

“Probably for the best.” He’s pushing his messy locks away from his face, sighing heavily. Phobos could only imagine what it was like to feel the same looming dread that Sung had felt back on that planet. It was like fire for him. All burning, all consuming… His lungs are already going tight at it, at the memory of ash coating his tongue and mouth, and he can’t help the shudder that runs through him at that moment. “Phobos, you okay?”

“Just...remembering.” It was funny, sometimes, how his lungs seemed to replace his wings. They would flutter just like his wings ought to, sometimes small and weak, sometimes his whole being shaking with it. He touches his chest, forcing a deep breath in, lids closing over his eyes.

“Shit!” They open as he startles at Sung’s exclamation. Oh gods, what’s now? 

And that’s when he finds himself face to face with a strange plant being who opens it’s mouth... 

...And begins to scream.

 

“Is he always that emotionally volatile?” Phobos and Sung are elsewhere and he ought to be worrying about it. Instead he’s grateful for it, for the momentary peace and quiet. The other Havve is staring at him, bare faced and unblinking. Weird to see a Havve real a real face, but he’s seen stranger at this point.

“Sung’s just…” He’s running a hand over his muzzle, golden eyes rolling up to the blue sky above them. Not a cloud to be seen. There was definitely something to this planet, but at this point he wasn’t even sure if it was worth exploring. Maybe they  _ should _ go back to that dead ‘verse. If Sung had heard something, it had to be worthwhile to at least double check, right? “He’s a good guy.”

“What Sung isn’t good?” The other Meouch scoffs. “That’s like, impossible.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” The other Havve murmurs. “There has to be a statistical way of figuring out what probability there is of versions of ourselves that don’t fit the standard definiton of ‘good’, Meouch.”

“I’m going to assume it’s small.” Meouch inspects his nails absently and the other Phobos is rolling his eyes at that.

“Small is not ‘none.” Havve says. “After all, look at the Havve who took your Havve and our Sung. How many more are like that?” That’s not sitting well with himself or his counterpart it seems. His own smuggler past seems all too relevant at that point and he’s suddenly grateful for the fact that no Meouch’s went and cut a bitch back in their universe. 

“This multiverse stuff hurts my head.” He mutters sourly as he paces about. “I just can’t wait to get this all figured out and go home.”

“Seconded.” The other Phobos says from the sandy ground. “We should probably go and get your friends…”

And that’s when they hear the scream.

There’s no hesitation between himself and the other Meouch as they race off towards it. “You’ve got the killer nose.” He calls to the other as they race across the sand. “What’s going on?”

“It’s…” He turns his nose up to the air, pausing only for a moment. “...Strange.”

“When you’re in another universe dude, strange equals bad, come on.” They probably ought to wait for the other Phobos and Havve but there’s no way they’re going to catch up in time. Gods, it felt good to run like this. The Leoian in him took to it like breathing. After all, his body had been made for it. To chase and hunt and-

And what, Meouch?

_ Kill. _

He shakes that intrusive thought away. Smuggling days were over. He was never going back to them if he could help it. Still, some things were hard to forget. He couldn’t help but wonder what kind of life the other Meouch led before he had joined his own personal TWRP. What had he done, what had he caused? 

He loses all train of thought when he sees the small gathering of aliens over the next hill.

“What the hell?” The other Meouch is saying, head tilting as he scents the air again. “Oh, oh weird…”

“Dude, what?”

“Plant people.” He gestures with a paw. “They’re all…  _ organic _ . Told you it was strange.”

Fair. He’s still stalking forward, tail stiff behind him. They didn’t have time to mess around, to blindly trust. Strangers in a strange land, after all, with nothing to help them but the Device and their own wits. He’s seeing Sung and Phobos now, the two pressed close together, speaking in low voices to the person at the head of the crowd. “Hey!” He calls out.

They all spin towards him and quite a few give a few high pitched screeches before the group leader lowers his hands placatingly. He gives a low whistle then before issuing a series of clicks.

Okay.  _ Weird _ .

“Meouch! Other Meouch!” Sung’s waving with a casual ease. “Meet other  _ OTHER _ Phobos!” He’s pointing at the strange ring leader of the group, who gives a high pitched whistle as he raises his hand high up above his head.

Very weird indeed.

The other Meouch is giving him ‘I told you so’ look which Meouch promptly returns with a quick flick of his middle finger. 

“Does he speak Universal?” Hell, did that even stand in this universe? Maybe not, but it was worth a try. 

“Kind of, it’s like a different dialect, but he’s been using this!” Sung’s trotting over and showing him a tattered notebook. Meouch takes it and begins to flip through the pages absently, impressed by the sketches and notes that span across it’s pages, cramming any and all available space held inside. “We were just explaining how we got here. He was one of the groups to show up back at home, came here to tell everyone about what happened once we sent them back. The Device must make some kind of big fuss when we showed up cos they sent someone out to check on us and well, here we are!”

The leafy Phobos nods. Meouch can’t help it then, he’s reaching out with his free paw to poke at the other’s “hair”, eyes widening when he feels the odd texture of it. “Meouch!” Sung shrills. “That’s rude!”

The other Phobos tilts his head at Meouch, smiling a bit from under his leafy fringe. Did he have eyes? A few of the other aliens did, so he could only assume they were covered. “Sorry, I was just wondering what the hell he was made out of.” He can tell by the way Sung looks at him that the empath can tell he’s not terribly sorry at all.

“Succulent.” Their Phobos finally says. “Almost.”

“Yeah. The desert climate? The varying plant appearances? Basically succulents, in their own special way.” Sung adds. Wow, a whole grown race of aliens. Anything was possible in space, Meouch supposes. 

Another wave of whistle-clicks ensues and he can see the other Havve and Phobos cresting the same hill they had thundered down mere minutes ago. They’re both taking in the sight, eyes wide and confused at the small crowd of aliens with them in the thick of it all. “Come on down! It’s safe!” Sung calls as he waves his arms eagerly. He can’t blame the other’s for their trepidatious descent, especially when all the aliens begin to chitter excitedly, fronds rustling. 

The succulent Phobos is scribbling away and shoving the pad at Sung eagerly. “He wants us to come to his home…” The empath’s face screws up at that and he’s giving an anxious sigh in response. “That’s, uh, very nice but we can’t stay for long... We need to find our friends.”

More writing and Sung’s nodding. “When you all came, something bad came through too. We’re missing our Havve, and their Sung. That’s why we’re here. We’re just jumping until we can get some kind of hint as to where they are.”

“What we really need is a universe where this is understood better.” The other Phobos has the Device out and he’s shaking it in annoyance. “There has to be a way to track other Devices if they’re all connected, right?”

“One would assume.” The other Havve notates dryly and Phobos is making a face at that. 

“Then how?!”

The other Phobos steps forward, holding his hands up and out. For a moment the purple Phobos hesitates before he’s placing it into his hands, a wary expression on his long face. He pushing back his fronds back from his face, milky white eyes staring at the cylinder before he’s handing it back to his purple counterpart. “Yes?” The purple alien prompts. Their own is watching with an unreadable expression, arms folded tight against his chest, antennae pointed towards the conversation. 

“What’re you getting?” Meouch asks Sung with a snap of his tail. The empath has a troubled expression on his face. “Anything?”

“He’s trying to remember something.” Sung’s voice is quiet. The other Phobos begins to sketch something out then, wincing apologetically as he has to tear the first page off. “No, no don’t worry.” He sees them staring in confusion and begins to explain. “He’s upset cos he wants more colors.” Sung explains as they all lean in. “Take your time.”

Now the other aliens are beginning to chime in and Sung’s eye is going wide with it. “They’re scared. Not of us, but they were when we first came because… because they saw something similar before.” Another sketch ripped away, the plant Phobos giving an annoyed growl. “Hey, it’s okay...”

Something begins to take shape. There’s the sky and a strange light coming down from it, striking the ground. That’s not the strangest thing, Meouch notes. No, it’s what begins to take shape within the light.

A body.

A man.

Oh gods.

“Sung.” The other Meouch whispers.

That’s  _ Sung _ .

 

He hadn’t been counting down the time that had passed since Havve had gone missing, but now he’s acutely aware of the fact that it’s technically been nearly three hours since it happened. Who knows how much time has passed with weird space-time physics? Did the Device negate that? Clearly Plant Phobos here had reacted like they had just seen each other no more than an hour ago, but what would happen on their next jump? How far along was Havve?  _ Where _ was Havve? 

Back in that dead ‘verse. 

He was  _ sure _ of it.

They’re in the heart of their city now. Limestone buildings raised around them and mosaic glass acting as the road. As they had learned this Phobos had had his fateful meeting with Meouch already, and it had come to him as a total surprise when he came back to his planet years later to see that his kind hadn’t died, not in the traditional sense at least.

They had grown back.

He hadn’t even dared look at Phobos when the other had drawn that bit of the story out. What the Lepid would give to see his friends again, his planet thriving once more. He had gone completely still at the other’s words before he had finally given a resigned sigh, the congratulations whispering out of him. Under it all? Jealousy, rage, wanting… Things that Sung knew that Phobos hadn’t felt for years and that were now taking him by storm.

Now he was going through his own internal crisis.

Another Sung doing gods knows what. Was the Havve that had attacked Phobos his, or were there two different agendas at play here? He could at least take a strange comfort in the fact that they hadn’t started this damn mess. That Sung (Nega-Sung? No, that was stupid…) had come to this planet some time ago, before Phobos had even known they were alive once more. That’s the only reason why they were still alive, Phobos had explained. If they had truly been topside when he appeared…

He’d be just like the two other Phobos’s standing next to him.

Sung knows the other means well, offering them a meal and a place to rest, but he  _ can’t _ be here. He feels gods damned anxious, fingers tapping out a strange beat on the side of his thigh, eye flicking back and forth across their surroundings until it falls upon the purple skinned alien. He’s still got the Device on him and Sung’s trying to figure out how he can grab it without being seen. Of course the other Meouch is watching him with a narrow eyed shrewdness and Sung can’t help but think that the other is onto his plans.

Shit.

The other  _ other _ Phobos is whistling pleasantly, more song than speech, as they make their way down the road. He had mentioned something about getting in contact with their Sung, but how long was that going to take? His pylon feels too tight, his armor too heavy, his core felt too gods damn hot in his chest…

“Sung.” 

The other Havve is peering at him. He’s donned his mask again and he looks so much like their Havve in that moment and his core  _ aches _ with it. “Is everything okay?”

“Not really.” He gives a short little laugh. “All of this is just… really throwing me for a loop. An evil me and an evil you!” He tries to laugh again but it’s even sharper this time. “Gods…”

“It will be okay. You just need patience. Together we’ll find the correct answer and fix this.” That was a good one. He manages a weak nod and the other Havve squeezes his shoulder before he’s joining his Phobos once more, speaking in a low voice.

And then he sees it.

The Device sticking out of the other’s back pocket.

Don’t do it.

Don’t do it Sung.

Fuck, he was doing it, wasn’t he?

“Sorry!” He shouts as he sprints forward without warning before he can chicken out. His fingers close around the cylinder and he’s racing off with it, doing his best to ignore the yells of confusion behind him. “C’mon, c’mon!” He’s shouting then too, struggling to unlock it, fingers slipping on the smooth surface, losing their purchase…

And it’s  _ falling _ .

It hits the ground with a terrifying crack, worse than when Phobos threw it to the ground because he can see a thin line racing its way up the side of the cylinder, the blue light from before spilling through. 

His kneepads hit the ground first and he’s gods damned grateful for them because they’re the only thing keep him from some broken ass kneecaps in that moment. He reaches out then, fingers closing around the Device as the light begins to shine. 

Someone shouts his name.

But he’s already gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes hello! I wanted to give a big shout out to celestial-cola in the last chapter for letting me borrow their Sung as well as a call out to agentduckorico, I snuck your Phobos in without you even knowing, you punk.
> 
> Of course, none of this wouldn't have been possible if it wasn't for Dylan (chaoticmindelectric) letting me use their a m a z i n g boys to counteract my own. I wouldn't have been able to shape this story without your input and help and I can't wait for you to get to the parts that you haven't even heard of yet (cos you know, surprises are fun.)
> 
> Succubos belongs to JACKIE (checkitandbalanceit) who I am also grateful for because Jackie is so talented and fun and has been one of my main supporters in my other fics for ages now and just... go say hi to Jackie, you won't regret it.
> 
> Thanks again for reading! Many fun things lie ahead :3c


	3. Chapter 3

“Dude. Dude, come on. Wake up.” 

He screams. He doesn’t mean for it to happen, and yet here he is, screaming bloody murder at the top of his lungs as everything comes into focus.   

“Jesus fucking Christ dude, what the fuck!” Whoever was shaking him flails back and away from him, a mess of long limbs that end up piled on the floor. Sung’s peeking over the arm of the couch (couch, he was on a couch, alright, that’s been settled) staring down at the strange being beneath him.

Undeniably and  _ completely _ human.

“What was that?!” He’s springing up and into Sung’s face then, curls bouncing forward with the motion. Gods, he has a  _ lot _ of hair. Sung gapes at him and the other male cocks his head in question. “Is this one of those... fuck, what’re they called?” He snaps his fingers rapidly in thought, eyes narrowing with it. “Uh, waking nightmare things? Is that it?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Sung says in a tight voice, fingers clenching on the couch arm. “I don’t… I don’t think so?”

“Well,” A pause in which the other man’s brows draw over his eyes, one spliced just so. “Are you okay?” 

He bites back a terrible laugh and manages to slowly nod his head. Whoever this man was, he was talking to him like they were friends, or at least close acquaintances. Oh boy...

“Well thank God, because we’ve got a lot shit to do.” He’s offering him his hand and Sung’s taking it, suddenly aware of how much taller the other male is. “Brian was wondering where you went. I just can’t believe you were asleep in all that shit.” The curly haired male is pointing to his armor and pylon then with a half smirk. “Are we not doing the get dressed in ten minutes thing anymore? Because I could  _ not  _ imagine sitting around in that all night backstage.” 

“Uh, right…” Everything’s starting to catch up to him as they make their way down the hall. What he had done, what had happened. “OH SHIT!”

“Dude, what!?” His new friend jerks in surprise, concern bordering on wariness as he yells. “You gotta stop with the random screaming thing, you’re freaking me out.”

“I-I gotta… I gotta go back. I-I forgot something!” He’s holding his hands up, hopefully in a placating manner. “One second. I  _ promise _ .” 

The human puts his hands on his hips, sighing some, thankfully relaxing after a moment. “Well, I’m gonna go get a snack, you weirdo.”

He’s hurrying back to the couch as quickly as he can, eye wide behind his visor, breathing short as he notices the damned Device isn’t there. Okay, just… do a little digging Sung. Shit falls into couch cushions all the time, right? He’s ripping the first one off and throwing it behind him, head whipping back and forth in desperation. “No. No, no, no no  _ no _ …” The second one is up and there’s _ still  _ nothing to show for it. “Gods damn it,  _ no _ .”

Nothing.

It’s  _ gone _ .

He places a hand on his stomach and takes a deep breath. You are not going to throw up or freak out, Doctor Sung. Not here, not now. Fuck, this was bad. He was stuck somewhere with no way of getting out, no way of contacting anybody, no way of knowing what the hell was even going on...

_ This is exactly what you got for trying to go off on your own. _

It’s Havve’s voice in the back of his head but _ not _ . It’s what the robot would say in that moment to him, chastising Sung just so. Strangely enough, it’s the thing that reels him back in, that helps him stand up straight and finally catch his breath again. He realizes then that he hasn’t looked  _ under _ the couch. Maybe it was that easy. He’s got his fingers curled at the bottom, lifting it up without even breaking a sweat nor a moment’s hesitation. “C’mere you stupid Device…” He mutters, grateful for how his core illuminates the darkness underneath. “Come to cone daddy.”

“Dude!” 

He turns and the same man from before is staring at him in abject horror as he lets the couch drop back to the ground with a loud boom. “...Hi…” Sung manages finally in a small, squeaking voice.

“You know, you said you were okay before but I’m really starting to doubt that.”

The other is moving forward with slow, cautious moments. “You sure you don’t wanna sit down? You know, once we make the couch a  _ couch _ again? I can get you some water, or maybe some food? Arin went and stocked the whole fridge up.” Who was Arin he wants to ask, but this Sung (or _ whatever _ his name was) probably knew that, so he just clamps his lips together and gives a shaky nod at the other’s pacifying tone. “You promise you’re not going to run away now, right?” The other gives a laugh but it trails off awkwardly. “Do you need me to call the guys?”

“Oh, oh no. It’s all good man. P-Promise!” He gives a double thumbs up then hoping his smile wasn’t too forced. Something deep inside him told him that meeting this Sung would not end well in the slightest.

The other’s eyebrows are just about to his hairline at his point and he’s letting out a low whistle. “Well, I don’t believe you, but I respect your wishes. Now be a dude and help me put the couch back.”

Okay Sung. You can do this. You just have to find out where the Device went. It may also help to find out your friend’s name, just don’t be too obvious about it. “Uh, so the plan for today…” He leads in as he pushes a cushion down.

“I think your cone’s too tight today, that or you had a small stroke. We were going to do some work on Cool Patrol, solo synth stuff, remember?” The guy gives him a pointed look. 

“Right…” Okay so the “Doctor Sung” of this universe was in band with some guys and he played the synth. The costume wasn’t out of the ordinary either, it appeared, so that was a plus. “Yeah, yeah. Just wanted to make sure I didn’t forget anything, like my… keytar...?” His word goes tight at the end, nervously hopeful he said the right thing.

“I don’t think we needed that today. If anything, Brian’s got one laying around.” Oh thank the gods. “I’m gonna call him actually.” 

“You do that man.” He’s taking the whole room in finally. Blue walls, some kind of weird material on them. Oh, that’s soundproofing material, isn’t it? A large TV so many strange boxes connected to it, and microphones. This wasn’t their recording room, at least… not for their music. What a strange world, indeed. He hears it then, a faint exclamation in a tinny voice over the phone, but it’s something.

Danny.

He waits until the conversation is done. He sure does seem nice, this Danny guy. He’s half slumped back into the couch, nodding slowly as he holds the phone up to his ear with long fingers. “Yeah, yeah. I found him. He’s kind of loopy. The guy’s must have kept him up last night. That’s what friends are for, right?” Danny’s looking over at him with a playful smile then and he can’t help but perk up in response to it.

“Uh, yup, t-they kept me up all night with scary games.” Sung finally says. “I’ve been trying not to think about it, but it must have all caught up to me in my dreams!” 

“Oh man, did we ever talk about when me and Arin played PT? Let me tell you, I could not sleep for a week. Japanese horror is crazy! They just… they really got a way of getting to ya.” Danny wraps one arm around himself, shivering a bit. “Wow, I’m wildly off topic. Brian! We will be there soon, would you like food on the way my friend?” A pause. “McDonald’s it is.” He’s hanging up and smiling at Sung. “I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for some delicious, nutritious McDonald’s.”

What the hell was a McDonald’s…?

“Danny.” Fuck Sung, focus. “Before you woke me up… did you notice anything. Like, a cylinder of sorts? About this long,” he gestures. “And probably a little fucked up looking, if we’re being completely honest.”

The human is snorting and giving Sung a pointed look. “What weird sci-fi thing did you find this time ‘Doctor Sung’, eh?” The other is elbowing him. “Something else amazing from the future of the 1980s?” 

“Haha, y-yeah, something amazing, alright.” There  _ had _ to be a Device here to get him here, right? Or maybe he had broken his so perfectly that he had managed to just end up in a universe where it didn’t exist. Maybe that’s why his wasn’t here anymore, because it  _ couldn’t _ be. Maybe he was stuck here forever.

Oh gods.

_ FOREVER... _

“Okay, you’re doing that weird thing again. Where you space out. I think it’s an Uber kind of day.” A hand clapping down on his back, bringing him back to reality. “I don’t think they’re gonna like the cone though, dude.”

“It stays on.” 

“C’mon man, no one’s gonna recognize you. LA’s huge!”

“...The pylon stays  _ on _ , Danny.”

“Oof, alright. Must be a helmet hair kind of day.” What a nice guy. Sung feels bad for snapping at him but it’s slowly becoming more and more obvious that everyone here was human in the most basic sense of the word. Someone walking around with a glowing core in their chest and one eye would  _ not _ go over well. “Sometimes I wish I had a giant traffic cone to put over this mess.” Danny’s pulling at an errant curl, that easy smile seemingly permanent on his face. “Anyways, let me handle the Uber and we’re off. It’s on you next time though. Do they have Uber in Canada?”

What the hell was a Canada?!

“Never mind, stupid question! Ours will be here in five minutes.” 

They’re walking out into the sun and gods, is it hot! And loud! All around him there’s  _ noise _ . Loud honking, voices, a sound of a jet roaring above head. He glances up, careful to keep his face turned away from Danny as he does. “Yeah, bet you’re regretting the whole costume thing now, aren’t ya bud?”

“...Just a little…” Sung says in a quiet voice. All of the little wrong things are starting to stick out to him. Something’s not right with the air… it’s…  _ polluted _ . There’s a low smog that hangs over the air and he can’t help but notice all the trash on the street too. They lived like this? With all of this happening? A small car pulls up and the man in the driver’s seat takes one look at Sung before giving an annoyed groan.

“Take that off or you’re not getting in my car.”

“Don’t be an asshole, man. We’re paying you.” Danny says easily. “He can just go in the backseat. I’ll take the front. That is, if you don’t mind.”

“Good with me.” The guy is  _ still _ glaring at him. How rude... ! It’s not like space was perfect, but most people usually had a bit more decency upon first meetings. He’s sliding into the back of the car, grimacing as his pylon bumps the car’s low ceiling.

“What did I say?! He’s gonna wreck my car, and then who’s gonna pay for it, eh!?”

“Can you just drive?” Danny snaps. “Like, isn’t that what Uber pays you to do?”

“Not enough.” The man grumbles and their off before Sung can even begin to pull on the strange safety apparatus.

The drive is gods awful. If they’re not speeding they’re stuck at a snail’s pace surrounded by what seems like hundreds of other cars just like theirs. He can see people on their phones, with dogs in the backseat, with their sunroof down and faces tipped up towards the sky. Humanity, these were real live humans… 

They’re at a stoplight when a small child notices him. Their eyes round and they’re pushing their face up against the glass of their backseat window, little hands sliding down as they gape at him. He raises one hand, opening and closing his hand, smiling at them. 

“Making friends back there?” Danny says in a warm voice as he peeks back. He’s flipping over to look at the human, his own lips pulling up even more at the corners.

“The cone helps.” He notes, knowing full well it’ll annoy their driver.

He flips back once more to wave goodbye. They smile back with a gap toothed smile and suddenly he’s hit with an immediate guilt. What the hell was he doing? He ought to be out looking for the Device, for Havve and the other Sung, not going to some random band practice with someone he didn’t even know. But what else could he do at that point? At least with Danny he wouldn’t get into  _ too _ much trouble. The whole situation is a double edged sword, one that he felt like he was slowly impaling himself upon with each passing moment.

 

McDonalds, it turns out, is fast food. 

Sung waits outside while Danny rushes inside. By the grace of the gods he somehow convinces the other to leave his phone with him and the moment he disappears he’s typing TWRP into the search bar, half dreading the results, half excited to see what awaits him. And there he is, the same exact outfit, the same exact everything almost (although he’s never personally sported a mustache like this Sung seems to do more often than not.) He has to laugh at Meouch because while Phobos and Havve are basically the same, Meouch is literally just some guy with a cat mask on. It is impressive, he’ll give them that, but still… kind of silly the longer you looked at it.

Onto the real articles then. There’s something called a Wikia and it’s downright baffling to see that this ‘Sung’ came up with ‘lore’ that resembled his own life story. A few more links in and that’s when he sees it.

The Device.

And it’s a gods damned EP.

He gives a disbelieving laugh because despite it not being anything like he was expecting, it’s still there. The same bright, blue light is painted across the album cover and even better yet, the Device is also a two part song. He’s got it playing through the phone’s when Danny walks out, two brown bags in hand. “Woah, throwback Doc?”

“O-oh, yeah. Just… was thinking of going back to some of my synthy-er stuff.” Gods, most of their songs even matched up. This was crazy. “We’ll see what it’s like in the recording studio, yeah?”

“Yeah man, I trust you.” Danny says casually as he tosses his hair back with a shake of his head. “I got you some McNuggets and some fries. You want some right now?”

He didn’t know what the fuck a McNugget was (were?) but fries? Gods damn, if he didn’t love fries. Danny’s holding the back open and he’s shoving a whole handful into his mouth, not realizing how ravenous he was until that point. “Should I...should I go back and order more?”

“Possibly.” Sung says through a whole mouthful of them.

The recording studio is a ten minute walk away and the whole time Danny makes pleasant small talk. This ‘Sung’ is lucky, he can’t help but think, for having a friend like this. There was just something so likeable about the older male. His casual gait, his soft voice. A calming presence, almost.

“Yeah, man, I’m just hoping Arin let’s us play it on the channel. They’ve been working on it for ages now.” He had been talking about some “indie” game made by some friend’s of a friend of Arin’s, who was Danny’s friend he could now safely assume, featuring a rock’em-sock’em rabbit character named Bippy. “They’ve got this Halloween one too planned, so maybe that for next Ghoul Grumps. We’ll see. After you good sir.” Danny’s opening the door and the A/C in the studio is such a relief that Sung nearly throws himself to the floor the moment he steps through. How did they live here? How was this just… accepted as the norm? 

“You’re right, he’s acting really weird. Weirder than normal.” A stout man with an excellent facial hair game going for him steps around the corner, pausing before Sung with a slow raise of his brows. “Are you dying?”

“I don’t think so. I hope not.” Sung rights himself. “So, music?”

“Music!” Danny and Brian both nod, probably thankful that Sung can at least manage that.

It’s nice getting into the studio, doing a sound check, getting everything set up and warming up. It’s something normal in the face of everything crazy. Sure your best friend and one of your multiverse counterparts have gone missing, and yeah, there’s an evil version of you and your best friend out there, but you have  _ this _ . Music. The one thing that he had always known and that would never betray him. Brian, he learns, primarily plays the keyboard but has a slew of other musical talents hidden away, and Danny…

Danny has the voice of an angel.

A lot of it gets hidden away by the simplified tunes that Danny has them work on, but every once and a while he’ll break out into a cover of something and Sung can’t help but pause, his fingers hesitating on the synth. His range really is impressive and the whole time he’s smiling, jumping around, just really enjoying it.

“God, I cannot wait to get everyone else in here. Are you  _ sure _ ‘Phobos’ doesn’t wanna work on Orgy for One? You know we love the dude.”

“Oh, you’ll… you’ll have to ask him yourself. You know how Phobs is.”

“Quiet and wiggly.” Brian notes with a chuff of a laugh. 

“If only one of us knew sign language, or had telepathy!” Danny teases. “Brian, tell me you’ve got that knowledge hidden away in that beautiful, big brain of yours.” 

“Surprisingly, no, I don’t Danny.” Brian says, playing out a “whomp-whomp” of sadness on his keyboard, his over-the-top frown really adding to it. 

“Well, we’ll never know, will we?” Danny says as he puts his hands on his hips.

Sung’s laughing and it feels so  _ good _ . Even before all this there was the chase to find General Badness and that had weighed down heavily on all of them. When was the last time he had just relaxed like this? Had  _ fun _ like this? “So, what’s the plan for the rest of the day, dude?” They’re packing up and Danny’s got a length of wire wrapped around his arm, microphone swinging absently from it. Sung looks up at him then, reality sinking back in, responsibilities bearing down...

“Great question...” He says, voice soft with worry.

“Didn’t say you were looking for something earlier?” There must be something on his face because Danny’s coming over to him, expression undeniably concerned. “I mean, I know Brian’s busy...”

“Mm-hm.” The older male notes from the other side of the room empathetically.

“...But I needed to get back to the Grump Office for a recording sesh tonight anyways. So I’ve got some free time to spare before that starts.”

“Aww Dan, you don’t gotta...” He’s starting but Danny’s holding a finger up in his face.

“But I’m  _ gonna _ .” Danny slaps a hand down on his pauldron. “What’re friends for?”

“Yeah.” He grins. “Friends.”

 

It’s been five hours now.

He’s really trying to not let it get to him, but with no sign of anyone else Sung can’t help but panic just a little bit. At least the Uber driver on the way back was a lot more pleasant, taking one look at Sung’s cone and giving an excited laugh at the sight. “Did Halloween come early?” She said. “That’s quite a look you got there, mister!”

“So tell me what we’re looking for again.” They’re standing side to side now in the recording room. “Cos when you were talking about it earlier, it sounded  _ kind of _ like a sex toy.” That spliced brow of Danny’s raises and he’s smirking playfully. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”

“No, but Meouch called shake weight, if that helps.” Sung snorts.

“...That’s  _ basically _ a sex toy.”

Sung groans. “Danny, focus, please?”

The older male is snorting and giggling to himself as he wanders further into the room. “I’m focused! I’m just also extremely amused by this entire situation. You can do both, surprisingly.” 

Yeah, and usually he was good about that, but instead Sung’s pacing the length of the room, turning just about everything in it over. What if it wasn’t here? What if it wasn’t even this apartment? On this planet? The earlier thoughts of being stuck here are beginning to creep in again. How would he even live here?

“ _ Mrow! _ ”

“Cat?” He says back to the sound, head tilting in confusion.

“Oh dang, have you not met Mochi or Mimi before? I could have sworn…” Danny’s shaking his hair out, puffs of dust coming off him from digging under the entertainment system. “Mochi, c’mere you…”

He spies the tail first, then the length of the cat’s body, and finally his face and  _ no _ .

It can’t be.

The gods damn cat has the Device clamped between his sharp little teeth.

“Danny.” The other’s name gasps out of him. “That’s it!”

“Huh, what? MOCHI, DID YOU STEAL THAT?! Bad cat!” Danny must step a little too heavily because the cat gives one cautious twitch of his tail before he’s scampering out of the room, leaving them both behind with mouths agape. “Son of a bitch, Mochi!” Danny cries finally. 

This could not be real. It’s almost comical in a sense, but he doesn’t have time to laugh. He  _ has _ to get that cat. “Mochi! Come on, Danny didn’t mean it!” He turns his voice saccharine sweet, like  _ that’ll _ convince the cat that he’s worthy or something. “I promise to give you belly rubs if you come back.” His voice edges into desperation because the damn cat is gone, not a trace to be found. “Damn it.” 

“You check that way, I’ll check this way.” Danny’s saying. “I’ll give a yell if I get it, yeah?”

Sung nods and rushes down the hallway, uncaring as he throws the first door open. That’s a bathroom, nothing special there. Back and out again, practically slamming himself up against the next door.

“MOCHI!?” He bellows as he throws himself into the room.

“Uh, no?” Two young men stare back at him in confusion. “Wait, aren’t you that guy from that band Danny sings with?” Asks one, his hat on backwards.

“It’s Tupper Ware Remix Party, Ryan, come on, use your brain for once.” The lankier male shoves at the other and Ryan’s shoving back just as quickly.

“Shut up Matt, I was  _ just _ going to say that.”

“Sure you were, you asshole.”

“Lovely to meet you both. Have you seen a cat?” He’s cutting them off before their banter can really escalate, knowing the expression on their faces all too well from his own experiences with Meouch. “Yay high?” 

“Named Mochi?” Matt says dryly, eyeing the other from behind his glasses. “No, we haven’t. We’ve been in editing hell for the past two hours. You’re welcome to join us if you want...”

“Sorrycan’t _ BYE _ .” Sung hears Ryan issue a ‘how rude!’ in response before he slams the door but he’s already tearing down the hallway once more, the two other males long forgotten. You’ll never see these people again Sung. Sure other Sung may have some weird questions to answer, but that’s not your problem, it could be a lot worse.

“ _ Mrrrffhfh _ .” His head whips around and he sees the cat peering at him from around a doorway. Okay, careful steps Sung, nice and gentle...

“Here kitty, kitty, kitty…” He’s practically simpering at this point. “C’mon, you know that doesn’t belong to you.” His words are met with a growl, but at least he’s not running off. Perfect. 

“Come to papa…” 

A door slams open further in the apartment and someone’s yelling and gods damn it, no! The munchkin swipes his paw out with a sharp hiss, scraping the ends of his fingertips before running off again. There’s a solid thirty seconds where he stays crouched, drawing in a deep breath before he’s groaning loudly in defeat. If only Meouch was here. Hell, the Leoian could speak several feline dialects, if anything could probably just sweet talk Mochi into giving it back. “Anyone home?”

“Not now Arin!” Danny yells back, prompting him back into action. Grab the cat, get the Device, and go Sung. No more dilly-dallying. 

“MOCHI.” He hears Danny yell from the opposite side of the apartment. Sung skitters to a stop before throwing himself back down the hall, towards the source of his voice. Please don’t say the cat ate the Device, gods please don’t say he ate the damn Device!

He falls, literally, flat on his his face as he slides into the kitchen, causing Danny to give startled yelp. He hears Mochi hissing again but there’s no time to hesitate and just like that he’s tumbling into the best tactical roll he’s ever done in his entire damn life. “DID YOU FIND IT?!” He shouts as he pops up. 

“Uh…”

“What? Did he eat it? Did he… fuck, what else can cats do? Did he bury it in his litter box? Cats… cats use… litter boxes…” His words begin to taper off as he sees Dan’s confused expression, bordering on horrified. “...Right…?”

Wait, he can see Dan’s face.

With no tint coloring his features.

Fuck.

Sung raises his hands up to his cone and feels the way it’s tipped. His face, the entire left side of his face was showing, almost all of his right as well if they were being completely honest. “...Please don’t scream.” He finally whispers after a moment.

“I’m not going to scream.” Danny responds in a tight voice. 

“And you’re not going to run away either.” He’s holding his hands up calmly, hoping the gesture will help Danny somewhat. 

“I really want to.” He squeaks and Sung grimaces.

“I know you want to, but that’s not going to help either of us because I’ll have to chase you down.” A pause. “And suplex you.”

“Holy shit.” Dan whispers and Sung’s forcing himself to speak calmly before he loses the other again.

“That thing that Mochi has… it’s some crazy sci-fi shit, just like you were saying before. I need it to get back home. I am Sung, but I’m not  _ your _ Sung.” 

“Yeah no shit.” Danny breathes out. “You have one eye.”

“Yes, and you have two, and so does everyone else on this planet.” He’s reaching up to undo the strap of his pylon, pulling it off to reveal his freckled face and pointed ears in their full glory. “I didn’t mean to end up in this universe, but I did, and I need to get back.” 

“So like, you’re real. Like the characters the guys came up with, t-they exist?” Danny’s voice is still high and strained as he hugs Mochi closer. “The lore?”

“All very, very real. And that’s the Device.” Sung points to it.

“I think I’m going to pass out.” Danny giggles hit a disturbingly high pitch.

“ _ Please _ don’t pass out. Danny, you are… super cool. Like one of the coolest guys I’ve ever met, and I’ve met a lot of people.” Danny’s just nodding numbly to all he’s saying and he really can’t blame the guy at this point. “Maybe one day we’ll meet again, but I need you to help me right now. I need that… to get back home.”

“Okay, I can… I can do that. You’re not going to like, drag me with you on a space adventure, right? Because that would be kind of cool, but I don’t think I’m really ready for something like that in my life quite yet.” Danny shifts Mochi’s weight in his arms with a nervous laugh, but there’s something in his eyes that the empath can’t help but notice. Sung let’s his core process it and he can’t help but smile because under all that skittishness is amazement and wonder and a desire for the great unknown.

His foot slides across the kitchen floor as he gives a small laugh. “Maybe another time man, when I’m not ‘verse hopping left and right.” When all this shit isn’t happening, more like. “You’d make for good company, and besides, we can get you to sing some songs for the band. You’re good dude, like…  _ really _ good.”

“Aw shucks, you’re making me blush Doctor Sung.” Out of nowhere there’s a terrible, unexpected melancholy coming off of the human and Sung’s eye is going wide with it. “Well, I guess this is good-bye.”

“For now.” Sung says encouragingly.

“Yeah, for now.” 

Danny’s gently prying the Device away from Mochi, careful not to upset the cat and yet managing to do just such. They’re laughing as the munchkin growls at them, Dan’s two eyes connecting with his own in that moment. “Good luck.” He grins.

Sung’s reaching out to take the broken Device into his hand when the room fills with a sudden and unexpected bright blue light. He moves without thinking, shoving the human behind him, very aware that it could be that other Havve, that other Sung. “Stay behind me.” He warns the other, squinting against the light.

“No fucking way.” Danny says into the the bright of it and lo and behold, five figures step forward. “Is that…?”

Well then.

“...Danny…” He says as the other Phobos’s furious expression comes into focus. “Meet my friends.”


	4. Chapter 4

Everyone is understandably pissed at Sung. Hell, even he is just a little bit.

Watching the other disappear to gods knows where, especially after hearing the Device crack on the ground of the other Phobos’s home planet, had been one of the most damning things Phobos had experienced in ages. For a moment they had all stood there in various stages of disbelief.

“I’m going to kill him.” The Purple Phobos finally growled out.

The killing of Doctor Sung would have to wait until the other one showed up though. He was gracious enough to lend his own Device out to them upon arriving. “If you take me to the source of where he jumped, I can probably trace it.” That might help. Just a bit.

By that point the other Phobos was really seething. His plant counterpart had tied his fronds back from his face and was watching the whole process with wide eyes, mouth rounded in fascination. He still couldn’t believe that this Phobos had his entire planet, his entire family, an entire life… 

There was no point in getting angry at the other because of it though. He was lucky and it was simple as that. He turned his thoughts to the other Phobos, Purpbos as Sung had so deemed him, wondering just what exactly had happened to him and his planet. He had had his own bitter phase years ago, a time in which his rage threatened to eat him up from the inside out, but he had grown past that. He had learned to forgive himself, forgive Meouch as well, and he was a pacifist now, so what kept the other from doing that as well? What went on inside that head of his? He remembers how the other smiled then earlier. Maybe it was just this situation. Phobos just really couldn’t tell. 

He’s approaching the Plant Phobos as the other Sung continues his calculations, a gentle touch to the other’s shoulder announcing his presence. “...Thank you.” He whispers to him. He doesn’t know what else to say, but that much felt necessary almost. The other blinks slowly before he’s breaking out into a dazzling smile.

“Thank  _ you _ .” He croaks out, taking Phobos completely by surprise. It must show because the other gives a wind whisper laugh before he continues.  “Sung’s...been teaching me… Universal… Hard, but… worth it.” He ends his sentence on a whistle. “We… have to look out for each other…” The other’s hand touches his, their fingers overlapping. “My family… is yours…”

There’s a sudden knot in his throat that’s nearly impossible to swallow past, so he just gives a jerky nod in response. It wasn’t Deimos and Io, but it was  _ something _ . “...His too…” The Plant Phobos tips his head towards the other Phobos. 

“I’ll let him know.” 

“And, we’re set!” The other Sung is placing his Device into the other Meouch’s hands. “You keep this for as long as you need. That Device you’ve been using is unstable. He popped through five different universe’s before he ended up in the one he’s in right now. I dunno how long you’re planning on looking for your friends, but stop by here on your way back, if they’re somewhere here, we’ll take care of them.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Meouch says but the other Sung is already waving him off easily.

“Phobos couldn’t have said it better. We look out for each other!” The other male smiles. “Now go and find your boys, you hear?” The Device is being unlocked and the other Sung and Plant Phobos are stepping back in response. “And see you soon!”

“Soon.” Phobos whispers back, feeling his mouth pull into a small smile.

Wherever this next universe is they’re not showing up in the middle of nowhere like they have for the past two jumps. He can make out something like a room past the brightness and a voice swearing, causing both their Meouch and Havve to tense next to him. 

They see the taller male first. Dressed in a simple short sleeved shirt and ripped jeans, his hair floating in the strange atmospheric change that the Device incurs. There’s also a cat in his arms and not surprisingly, Sung is standing guard right in front of them. His expression changes as recognizes them, astonishment causing his mouth to round before he’s breaking out into a nearly infection grin. 

“Danny, meet my friends.” He says after a pregnant pause.

Phobos doesn’t even hesitate. He’s throwing himself at the other male, a soft noise escaping him as he hugs his friend. “Woah, hey. Hey now, it’s okay. I’m okay.” Sung’s saying as he smooths a hand across his shoulders. 

“Didn’t know.” To lose both Sung and Havve was nearly impossible to consider. He’s pulling away then, his antennae twitching wildly as he tries to get a sense for the room they’re in. “Where is this?”

“Earth. Everybody, meet Danny.”

“Pink.” The human says in a mystified voice as his dark gaze falls upon him, it then darts to the other Phobos. “...Purple…” Another pause, this time both Meouch’s being studied by Danny. “And... furries?”

“Excuse me?” Their Meouch steps forward with a look of simultaneous anger and confusion at the term Danny deems him with. 

“Am I not considered worth mentioning?” The other Havve says over the sudden uproar, sighing as he pushes his mask away from his face. “Apparently not.” 

“Guys… we  _ cannot _ do this here. There’s not really any aliens here and if anyone else sees us, this could get bad.” Sung’s flapping his hands worriedly, pushing them all back and away from the still wide eyed human. “Thanks again Danny.”

“Yeah, let’s not have you end up in Area 51.” Finally they’re all calming down and Phobos can see how grateful Sung is for it.  “Thanks  _ you  _ for today Sung, know I’m always down to jam again.” The human holds his hand out and without hesitation Sung takes it into his, firmly clasping it and shaking it eagerly. “Oh c’mon, you gotta… gotta go in for the fist bump dude.”

“Oh shit, yeah.” Sung laughs and what an odd sight the two make, cyclops and human, but then there’s the fact that they’re both laughing and smiling. Despite the fact that they were two different species from two completely different universes they were, without a doubt, friends now. They finish up their strange hand slapping ritual (Phobos had never understood the point of a secret handshake, something that upon being stated had caused the empath to fake sob at the fact) and now Sung was joining them, pointedly ignoring the other Phobos as the purple alien glared at him. They’re just about to leave when Sung leans out. “Danny, one last thing!” The Device’s energy crackles around them but Sung’s still yelling over it.. “Tell ‘other Sung’ he needs to slow down a bit. When I was listening to the playback of your guys’s previous sessions, it was really telling!”

“Oh, damn, okay dude. Got it!” Danny gives them a thumbs up and Sung’s returning it just in time before they’re gone.

He’s not sure where they’re programmed to go next but the moment they arrive the other Phobos is getting right up in Sung’s face, not even taking a moment for them to all settle in. “What the hell is wrong with you?!”

“Woah, woah, c’mon now.” Sung says in a low voice, hands coming up, this close to curling into fists. He can see it in the way Sung holds himself and Meouch must as well because the Leoian is inching closer as quietly as he can, posed to stop the other if need be.

“What the hell were you even doing on that planet? A jam sesh?” Phobos’s lip curls back from his teeth. “You know, you were acting real fucking worried earlier, but I guess we have time to fuck around and play pretend now, apparently!”

“What else was I supposed to do? I lost the Device, I didn’t want to reveal my identity…!”

“You wouldn’t have had to do that if you had just waited for the other Sung to show up, but apparently it’s about what you want, isn’t it Doctor Sung?”

“Phobos, come on...” The other Meouch starts forward, paws curling with uncertainty.

“Our Sung is missing because he came to help  _ your _ Phobos.” A finger is being whipped in his direction and he doesn’t even have a chance to respond because the other is getting back up into Sung’s face, crowding over the empath’s shorter stature. 

“If you had just let me go back…”

“And what, Sung? Even if you heard your Havve, which I still find highly unlikely, how were we going to find him? This Sung was able to track your Device and it took just under an hour to figure out. Pretty damn quick, huh?” Sung’s going deathly pale before his whole face flares with an embarrassed flush. “But you just couldn’t wait, could you?”

“...I’m sorry…” Sung’s choking out in a small voice but Phobos is shaking his head, apparently not yet done with the other.

“Sorry doesn’t cut it, not when there’s lives at stake, not when it’s been nearly six hours since this all started and we haven’t gotten anywhere closer to finding our friends. So take your apologies and shove them, alright?”

The empath has his hands curled at his sides and there’s a subtle shaking running through his entire frame. The other Phobos blows out an unimpressed breath before he walks forward, making sure to knock his shoulder up against Sung’s without any kind of apology. “I...I just…”

“We’ll talk later?” Meouch is saying. The other Havve and Meouch have gone off with their Phobos, both casting looks behind them before they’ve hurried off. “I know this is a lot Sung, but you need to stick with us. Stay with us.”

“...Okay.” Oh, and that breaks Phobos’s heart. Sung cried, a lot, but it was always for others, not for himself. He couldn’t remember seeing the other so helpless, so lost. He wants to say something, do something to fix it.

But then there’s a high pitched whine.

It’s so subtle he almost doesn’t notice it but then Meouch is crouching low, tail swishing back and forth, nostrils flaring. “What?” Sung’s not so secretly wiping at the few tears that have slid down his cheeks, voice warbling. 

“Do you hear that?” Meouch says in response, head cocking left and then right. He and Sung are both nodding and the Leoian makes a face. “You shouldn’t be able to. The frequency is just… extremely high.” His ears perk forward. “Do you hear  _ that _ ?” Something in his tone is telling. He doesn’t mean the strange whine that’s akin to tinnitus winding its way into their ears, he means something else.

“Something’s wrong.”

 

This wasn’t good.

Phobos is furious and so far Meouch hasn’t been able to calm the other alien down. He’s giving a sigh, careful of the roots underfoot. They’re on some kind of subtropical planet, and the wet oppressive heat is pushing down on them unrelentingly. He’s grateful for his internal tracking system because by this point they would have been lost five times over given Phobos’s manic path through the threes.

“We’re better off just going on our own at this point.” Phobos finally snaps. He got like this sometimes, hard edged and unforgiving. Sometimes there was nothing they could do but wait the storm out. “We’d probably find Sung a lot sooner.”

“And their Havve.” He reminds the other male as gently as he can.

“...Right…” Phobos says after a moment. He grimaces and shuts his four eyes, exhaling heavily. “I’m sorry, that’s not… that’s not okay of me.”

“It’s okay Phobs. It’s been a long day.” Six hours and counting. How long could do they do this for? Could they afford to stop at this point? Even now he starts to feel strange and off balance, a ringing taking up in his head.

No, wait, not exactly...

Meouch, of course, hears it too. He lets out a surprised growl before he swivels his ears. “Are you getting anything?”

“Nothing I can make sense of…” He pushes his mask back from his face, fingers careful through his purple locks. “Very discordant, not pleasant, that’s for sure.”

Phobos’s own long ears are turned towards the source as well, his lower lids closed in thought. “It sounds almost like… like music, doesn’t it?”

“Bad music.” Meouch gives a sharp laugh but it’s clear that he isn’t actually joking around. “What is that?”

“I’m going to assume troubl-” It changes then, grows deeper, and there’s a series of low noises that accompany it, rising up into a terrible crescendo. “What is that!?” Phobos says as he covers his ears in an earlier echo of Meouch’s words.

“Someone’s hurt.” Havve’s pushing through the hanging vines, eyes widening when he sees something curling among the trees. Gas. He stumbles back, warning moments from bursting out of him, when the realization hits.

They’re surrounded by it.

They see it too once it hits the patches of sunlight through the trees, an oily sheen to it before it winks out again. That high whining is back as well and it almost hurts. He’s able to push past it with a grimace. “So we’re either about to die, or we’re immune to this.” Havve finally grits out as he waves his fingers through the gas. “I would like to assume the latter.”

“One would hope…” Phobos is still covering his nose and mouth, eyes flicking back and forth. “This isn’t safe though, we better not test it.” 

“But what about the voices?” Meouch is insisting, throwing his hands out in a pleading fashion. “We can’t just leave them.”

“This isn’t our world, Meouch, much less our universe. Whatever’s making this gas and whoever is making those noises, maybe they’re not good. We just can’t assume-”

And that’s when the other Sung, Phobos, and Meouch sprint past them.

“...Or we can just go, I suppose.” Phobos sighs, apparently accepting the inevitable.

It doesn’t take long to catch up to other group. The other Phobos is touching the side of this helmet as he’s bent over, a soft whirring issuing from it. “Is he getting sick?” Their Phobos says, brows drawing in worry.

“No, he’s just catching his breath. The bad lungs, remember?” Sung says after the other signs shakily. “I  _ told _ you we didn’t have to run.”

The Lepid shakes his head before standing up straight, his chest rising and falling unevenly. “We heard… it wasn’t screaming, but it was something.” The other Sung is saying. “I just wanted to get closer to check.”

Phobos actually looks somewhat impressed at the empath’s response. “If they aren’t good people, we need to move on Sung.” He still notes in a quiet voice. “Even if they’re in pain, we don’t have the moral obligation to choose what’s worth living and what’s not.” The other Sung’s fingers hesitate on his pylon but Phobos doesn’t relent. “You understand that, right?”

“...Yeah, I do.” The chin strap is undone and the pylon comes off with a flourish, the other Sung’s sandy blonde locks sticking up with left over static. His eye becomes unfocused and he’s touching the light in his chest, going somewhere beyond them. That was his core, wasn’t it? The very thing that took in all these emotions and turned them into something tangible for the empath, something that he could understand and feel himself. He’s coming back then, blinking slowly, before he’s shaking his head in disbelief.

“What? What’s going on?” The other Meouch grabs his shoulder and shakes him. “Sung, c’mon man!”

“Funk.” The word falls out of him and everyone becomes very, very still. “It’s Funk.”

 

Funk, however strange and different it may be, was still Funk. He gave a nervous tail swish, knowing how narrow his pupils were, how flared his nostrils have become in response to the word. The air tastes sweet and cloying when he tests it with his tongue and for a moment his eyes connect with the other Meouch and he isn’t even surprised to see the other wearing an expression of sick horror.

Universal constants, Sung had said after all. 

“Everyone’ frantic. It’s like they know what it is, b-but they just can’t stop…” He’s pulling his pylon on hastily, appearing to be moments away from throwing up all over the jungle floor. “They have to keep… k-keep going.”

Phobos is touching his helmet once more, sucking in a desperate sounding breath in response. “We have to do something, they’re helpless!” The other Phobos stares at the empath and none of this can end well, so he steps between them with a low growl.

“I agree, we’re seeing if there’s anything we can do. At least, Sung and I are. You can all… stay behind, if you want.” Gods, did he get it. The past a subtle knife, cutting deeper and deeper yet with each passing moment. They shouldn’t have to deal with this, none of them should, but sometimes you needed to be brave… no matter how much it hurt. 

“I will go as well.” The other Havve is masked within moments, red eyes skimming their surroundings. “Let’s make this quick.” 

The other Meouch, the other Phobos, and their Phobos are left standing in an awkward circle when the darker skinned male joins them. “There’s no shame in staying behind.” He couldn’t speak for the others, but he knew their Phobos had to be dying on the inside. The visor of his helmet hid the Lepid’s expression but there was a tenseness to his shoulders and a way he held himself that was undeniably upset.

“ _ Please _ .” He signs suddenly, fingers circle the front of his chest. Please what, Meouch wants to ask, but there’s no time because Sung’s dragging him deeper into the jungle. Please make it right, please don’t let them die, please don’t let this be a repeat…

The smoke is getting thicker and his head hurts and he can’t help but think maybe they can be influenced by whatever this is, but Havve and Sung are charging forward with no hesitation. Must be his enhanced sense of smell… he unties the headband from his forehead, holding it up to his nose as they plunge further in. Please don’t be too late, please.

Please.

And when they stumble into the clearing where crystalline houses jut out from the mossy ground, where the sun shines down to highlight the spill of gas that seems to emanate from the forest floor, Meouch can’t help but stare in absolute horror at whatever species had been subject to it.

They were glittering things, sinuous on the ground as their body jerked and writhed uncontrollably, but that wasn’t the worst part. It was the way their fingers had dug at the ground until they bled incandescence, the way their jaws fell open with cry after terrible cry.  

“Gods.” Sung said in a terrible voice. “Was this…?” He’s not moving, barely speaking above a whisper, but Meouch catches it all. 

“No, we just burned it all on Phobos’s planet.” He hears himself say, like he’s in some kind of trance. “Fumigas plant released all these pollens, we couldn’t stop, they were immune but we weren’t.” Rage and fire and the sound of wings tearing, Phobos’s scream echoing over and over, tumbling in his mind, a rabbit hole that he had fallen down until the first touch of metal has kissed his chest.

And then he had died.

For the seventh time.

Sung’s tipping forward, gathering a small child into his arms a few feet away. Meouch doesn’t even have time to warn him as he rips his pylon off, barely even bothering with the chin strap. “Please.” He hears the empath whisper in a tight voice. “Tell me…”

They’re issuing full body jerks in Sung’s arms despite the cyclops holding him as close as he can. “Hey, hey, it’s going to be okay, we just need to get you out. We need to get ev-everyone out.” Sung’s got this desperate smile on his face and he can only stare at the other sadly, knowing very well they won’t be able to do it. It’s too late. Sung  _ has _ to feel it when he holds the child closer. 

It gives a sigh then, almost blissful, before it goes still in Sung’s arms. Soon every other alien follows, body’s lifting in unison before slumping back down again. “...No, no, no don’t…” Sung begins to rock back and forth, shining blood getting all over the front of his suit. “ _ Don’t _ .”

“It’s such a shame, isn’t it?” A new voice says and Meouch can’t quite believe it.

_ The same height, the same body, the same core in his chest.  _

“Not everyone reacts well to Funk in this universe…” 

_ Same sing song voice. _

“Too bad these two had to get all caught up in it too.”

Two bodies being dropped, another Sung and another Meouch. 

Sung gives a choked noise as he watches them flop. “Oh Doctor Sung, can’t you tell? They’re just sleeping, is all.” The other male coos as he takes another step forward, dark cape billowing out behind him,

_ Same dimpled smile. _

A hand on Sung’s jaw, cupping his friend’s freckled cheek. “I must say, the Device is very fascinating, isn’t it? Like it has a mind of it’s own.” Sung’s still got the the dead child in his arms, breath coming out of him in low pants. “Why did it bring you here? What did you ask of it?”

“Who are you?” Sung grits out in a low voice, tears slipping down his face.

Sung.

Not Sung.

“Just call me Doc Boredom.” The other smiles and his teeth are jagged fangs in his mouth. “Or better yet, just call me Doctor Sung.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> >:3c   
> that is all


	5. Chapter 5

For a moment he can only stare at the other. It’s like looking into a funhouse mirror, a warped version of him that shouldn’t exist. A copy of himself made out of something twisted and all things wrong. The body tumbles from his arms, falling to the rainforest floor with a sickening thud. “Did you do this?” He says in a hoarse voice as he stares at his own horrified expression in the other’s visor. Boredom (not Sung, gods he refuses to call the other his own damn name) tilts his head before glancing around languidly, taking another too casual step forward.

“The Funk? Yes and no. See, it’s a natural resource in this universe. In small doses, it can actually cause euphoria in most.” Boredom strides over to a spot in the ground, kicking back a clump of moss to reveal the hole underneath. “That’s not always the case though. It can cause madness, eventual death. In reality, I was just looking for something and I happened to accidentally cause the leak.”

Sung gives a choked noise. A laugh, he realizes moments later. He had actually laughed at what the other was saying, the clinical tone in which he spoke. Boredom cocks his head in response, lips parting just so. “Is there something funny, Doctor Sung?”

“I just find it funny that you call it an accident. You know so much about it, you would think you’d be a bit more careful, and what about that Sung and Meouch? Why are they asleep? Why did you have them held hostage in your own gods damned arms if it was an accident?!” With each word his voice rises that much more in volume, until he’s damn near screaming at the other male. 

“Am I really that transparent?” Oh and he  _ loves _ it. He smiles at Sung and it’s filled with so much self satisfaction that Sung’s sick with it. “It probably helps having that thing in your chest, doesn’t it?.” Boredom taps his core with a slow casualness, smile growing to the point of breaking on his face. Something sickly begins to thread it’s way through the pride then, a madness so discreet that for a moment Sung almost can’t discern it.

Without warning Boredom moves. All he hears is the other’s cape snap in the air and he doesn’t have time to even blink before something else happens.

The other Havve meets him halfway.

Boredom’s got some kind of staff made out of light bearing down onto Havve’s knife but the other’s hold doesn’t break. Havve spins into action, a silver black blur that can’t be tracked, his knife stabbing down at Boredom again and again. He can feel Meouch pulling him back but he wriggles out of the Leoian’s grip, gathering the other Sung and Meouch into his arms, the other’s name exploding out of him in a blind panic. “HAVVE.”

Boredom’s dancing away with that manic smile still on his features. His staff blocks each stab of the knife until he lances it forward, catching Havve’s shoulder between the slots of armor. He hears it happen, the other male’s skin  _ literally _ sizzling through his morphsuit, the smell of burning skin wafting over on the tepid air. His stomach lurches violently and all he can do is scream the other’s name again, tears spilling over as he does. “HAVVE!!!”

“More human than not.” He hears Boredom coo softly before his staff nearly gets the other male across the stomach. “You’re all so  _ fragile _ ...”

“What are you talking about?” Havve grits out, the hand holding his knife shaking. He switches it to his left, holding the blade aloft at Boredom, all cool calculation in that moment.

“There’s more similarities than you would think. I’ve meet so many of you, learned so many stories, ended even more.” Boredom gives a brittle laugh, head tipping up and back towards the canopy above. “Even when the blood isn’t red, you all bleed the same. They all do…”

“He’s insane.” Meouch hisses, every inch of him fear and desperate to get away. “We need to go.” 

He can feel the broken Device still tucked away in his hip bag but he doesn’t dare use it. Not when Havve is still posed to fight, not when they have no way of contacting the other Meouch and Phobos’s. The Sung in his arm stirs with a weak noise, lids fluttering some, his metallic hair dark with sweat. 

“Havve, please.” Meouch growls and the dark skinned male is giving a quick shake of his head as he comes back to hem. “We need to go.” Boredom’s laughter is beginning to die off and Sung’s not sure how much time they have left. “Let’s go!”

Havve casts one last glance at Boredom before he’s scooping the other Sung into his grip. He throws him over his left shoulder and races off the way they came, leaving them to scramble back to their own feet. Sung takes one last glance at the scene before them. Boredom in the middle of all those dead bodies, the last of the gas fading into nothingness, taking the ringing in his ears with it. 

“What happened to you?” Sung whispers, unable to help himself.

Boredom’s head snaps to his and he does that same thing from before, his lips parting like he has something to say. The emotions the other feels is a cancaphony, a discordant mess that slams itself against his core in a desperate attempt to be known, and Sung can only stumble back with a wide eyed look. Much, so much, an endless suffering...

“Everything.” The other says back in a small voice.

The staff is being stabbed down into the ground mere inches away from him then. He can hear it’s strange hum and in that moment he knows fear. He hadn’t felt anything like this before. The death of his planet had been desolation and misery, stepping between Meouch and Phobos had been a sense of righteousness and a need to protect. Even the fight with Badness had been a challenge, one which he had taken on with an unceasing smile on his features and a with bravery in the face of danger. This was fear, pure and genuine, nearly stealing the breath from him and driving him to a cold sweat. “What makes a universal constant, Doctor Sung? Why do they have to die every single time?” Boredom breathes out, leaning in. “Why is this the destiny the stars wrote for us? Why can’t we save them? Why can’t I-” 

There had been something on his face in that moment. Maybe it was regret. Maybe it was revelation. It doesn’t matter because it’s lost to Boredom’s mania with moments, the other’s facial expression smoothing itself into disconnect. “It doesn’t matter.”

Gods, yes it does, but Sung realizes in that moment that he very well could die, and he doesn’t want to. He kicks his leg out, careful not to sweep the unconscious Meouch, catching Boredom under his feet. He doesn’t even chance looking back, instead half grabbing-half dragging the other along with him. Don’t look back. Gods,  _ don’t _ look back.

Meouch’s paw is on his shoulder after a moment, pushing him away from the grisly scene, away from Boredom and his insanity and they’re running for who knows how long, really until Meouch apparently deems it safe. “We just can’t leave them.” Sung pants out as he shifts the Leoian’s counterpart in his arms, silently grateful when Meouch takes him into his arms.

“We can’t take them either Sung…”

“THEN WHAT?!” The scream rips free of him and even he’s surprised by it. “What the fuck are we supposed to do, Meouch!? Leave them here for that son of a bitch? He nearly killed Havve, would have killed me. He’s… he’s insane. We find everyone else and then we-” Oh gods, what if something had happened to them during all of this? Sung can feel frustrated tears gathering in his eye again. Half an hour ago he had been jamming with Danny, and now he was what? Running for his life with the blood of innocents staining his hands. “Gods, I’m gonna…”

He can’t help it. His stomach empties itself with a violent heaving that travels through his entire body. He sees Meouch turn away in the corner of his eye, bringing a hand to his nose. I’m sorry, he wants to say, despite it being a stupid thing to apologize for. It’s just his body trying to protect itself, the stress literally driving him to be sick.

The same paw that graced his back earlier is rubbing the spot between his shoulder blades above his armor moments later, the Leoian giving an encouraging murmur as he finally begins to stop. “Hey… Hey… It’s gonna be okay Sung…” Was it though? He works a glove off and runs the back of his hand across his mouth, a low groan leaving him. 

“It will be, when we get off this damn planet.” The sick coating his mouth almost causes him to puke again but he manages to spit most of it out. “We still can’t… leave them behind... Wanna find everyone else first and then we’ll make a decision.”

“Spoken like a true leader.” Meouch says, sounding proud. “I’m not smelling that son of a bitch either, so we’re safe to travel a bit more slowly. I mean it Sung, no pushing yourself.” Meouch is adjusting his hold on the other, giving him a pointed look. 

Fine. He’s throwing his pylon on. He can’t take Meouch’s pity right now and it helps him focus his thoughts inwards. Find the others, make sure this Meouch and the other Sung were okay, get off planet… then what? What was the next step? How were they supposed to find Havve and Sung now that they were basically on the run? Go back to the the last Phobos’s planet and talk to their Sung? What if it was too late? What if they had jumped too many times? What if they could trace Boredom’s jumps? Gods, did they want to?

Little things first, Sung. Find the others.

The whole forest feels like a death trap now. Any moment Boredom could appear flying through the trees, or they could step on another Funk gas trap. The whole damn thing holds itself still, not a bird cry or even the sound of the wind to comfort them. Meouch keeps his face tipped up towards the canopy, nostrils flaring with every step they take. “Close…” He says after ten minutes of near stumbling. “This way…”

Sung’s almost too scared to ask if they’re okay. Instead, he follows Meouch past the hanging vines. There’s a monster of a fallen tree here, half rotted and hollowed out, the perfect hiding spot. Havve’s at the forefront, crouched and knife ready, his eyes trailing back and forth with a predatory accuracy until they settle on them. “You’re alive.” He says, causing everyone else in the group to jump in surprise.

“Barely.” Meouch says roughly as he deposits the other on the ground. “I don’t know if Havve briefed you, but we can’t be here.”

“What about them?” Phobos asks as he rips his helmet off his head, small brows drawn over his large eyes.  _ Attaboy _ , Sung wants to say, but he’s too busy slumping against the nearby tree wall, the exhaustion of everything crashing down on him. 

“What about that other Sung?” The other Phobos counters, words laced with meaning. “It was already hard enough with one possible threat, now we’ve got another one that we know is actively coming after us. This is bad.”

“Thank you, Phobos, we really couldn’t tell.” Meouch snarls at him in response. The other Meouch steps right up into his space, lip pulling back from his teeth, showcasing his fangs as he begins to growl low in his throat. “Oh, fuck off with that shit.”

“Can we please…” Phobos steps forward with a weary sigh. “Not fight?”

By the grace of the gods the Sung they had managed to rescue is stirring, blinking his quicksilver eyes at them. “...Well this is interesting.” He says in a soft voice after he takes note of them. “Can anyone tell me what’s happening?”

Where did they even start?

Meouch apparently is more than happy to detail it all. The Funk, the strange aliens, Boredom’s appearance and his strange words. The whole time Sung can only draw his knees up to his chest, his visored stare taking in everyone here as his thoughts drift back, back, back into that moment. What did cause universal constants? Frequent occurrences over the span of space time? What was preordained and was was simply just chance?

_ Why can’t we save them? _

_ Why can’t I- _

Gods, he had seen so much of himself in the other in that moment and it had terrified him.

“We’ll keep an eye out.” He can hear the other Meouch stirring now as well, the silver clip in his right ear catching in the light. “We were inspecting the planet and he must have taken us by surprise, I don’t know how to describe it.”

“It was my fault, I was… getting distracted by the Funk.” Meouch runs a hand over his muzzle. “‘M sorry Sung…”

“Don’t apologize Meouch, you’re fine.” They’re going off into their own little world now and suddenly it feels so gods damned invasive that they’re even here right now. He glances towards his Meouch and Phobos, tipping his head towards the Device sticking out of the other Phobos’s pocket.

“We ought to go.” The Leoian announces once he gets the hint. “We’ve spent enough time here…”

Time spent doing what? Failing at saving people? Watching everything go to hell? He bites down on his lower lip, holding back a whimper. He wants to go home, he wants to find Havve, he wants to be done with this all. How many hours now? Seven? More? He’s going gods damned insane-!

“Hey.” 

They’re all watching him now and Phobos is mere inches away from him. “Hey.” He repeats again in a softer voice as he puts his hand over Sung’s. “Stay with us.”

Sung’s holding on as tight as he can until he can see the hint of a wince on Phobos’s features, but it’s gone in an instant and the Lepid is squeezing back just as hard, the pain surprisingly comforting. Real, this was  _ real _ . “I’m not… not going anywhere.”

He feels adrift without Havve’s link. How strange of a comfort it had become after all this time. How the other’s presence had become an anchor over the years, a tempering security that somehow managed to always keep him tethered. He draws in a shaking breath before forcing himself to his feet. “You good Sung?” Meouch says, tail waving casually.

He looks at all of them. Phobos is still close to him, antennae bobbing with a forced casualness, the other Phobos has the Device in hand, twisting and untwisting the lock mechanism idly. Both Meouch’s are watching him with worried expressions next to Havve, and the other Sung and other Meouch? They’re simply just standing there, looking completely at a loss for words.

“You remember the Sung from before, right? Shiny Sung? If you see him, or a Havve that doesn’t try to kill you on the spot, keep them safe. We’ll come back, check in…” 

“Of course.” The metallic Sung’s eyes go molten with determination. “And we’ll try and handle Boredom if he’s still here.”

“Be safe he’s… not stable.” Havve rolls his bad shoulder, hissing slightly from under his mask. “Don’t approach him if you don’t have to.”

They’re saying their goodbyes and it’s so damn awkward. For a moment the other Meouch, the Meouch from this universe, hesitates before he’s pulling Sung into a hug. “I know it’s hard, but don’t blame yourself. The Funk, it just… it gets in their head, some of them want it to stop and they’ll do anything to get it to stop. There was nothing you could have done.”

That didn’t make it any easier but he grips the other back before pulling away. “Thank you.” He manages in a thick voice. “Stay safe.”

“You as well.” 

He falls back to the rest of his group. Where now?  _ What _ now? The same questions keep tumbling over in his mind until he’s sure he’s going to get a migraine from it. “Boredom said…” Sung starts.

“We are not taking his advice!” The other Phobos shrills. “He’s insane!”

“Let me talk!” He snaps at the other. “He asked me what I asked the Device to get here. Maybe we’re not giving it enough of a purpose. After all, that’s how you were able to find me, right?” 

“But the other Sung gave it a location to follow.” Havve supplies, careful as he takes the the Device from the purple alien, his head tilting as he studies it as if it were in a complete new light now. “Much like earlier, when we sent everyone home.”

“But what’s driving it every other time? Why has it taken us where it’s taken us? The first time it took us to it’s ‘verse, but then it took us somewhere none of us even know! Then I went and broke the damn thing and it took me somewhere that the Device doesn’t even technically exist. So what’s stopping us from doing that? From  _ asking _ it to take us to Havve and Sung?”

“Common sense.” Phobos grinds out. “Is what’s stopping us from doing just that, besides… the last Sung said it was unstable, anyways.”

Cue the collective groan around the group as they stare each other down. Sung’s so tired of fighting though, of butting heads with the other alien. He pushes the breath out between his teeth and takes a step back before leaning forward once more. “I know I’ve pulled some stupid shit since this all started, but I’m asking that we please try this. If it doesn’t work, I’ll follow your lead, no questions asked from here on out.” 

Phobos quirks a slow eyebrow at him. “If this doesn’t work, we trace our way back to the second ‘verse we landed in and we work with that Sung. No more gallivanting around, no more ridiculous attempts at trying out the first thing that comes to mind, we buckle down and we find our friends. Boredom is not our problem, if you want to make him your problem, you can do so after we’ve found our Sung and your Havve, understood?”

He stares up at the other before he manages a terse nod. “Good.” A pause and they all stare at each other. “D-Do I? Do I do it?” Phobos asks, his bottom lids going wide as his top squint. 

“Do we all?” Phobos says in a  trepidatious voice, his own bug eyes ever wide as he stares down at the Device. 

“Do we say it outloud?” Havve says after an awkward moment. “Or do we simply think it?” 

“Holy shit this is stupid.” Meouch growls with a snap of his tail. “It’s not sentient! It’s not going to do something because we wished really,  _ really _ hard. Just do another jump, fuck this.” The Leoian’s tense, his fur almost standing on end by this point. But no, that isn’t the answer, is it? Something deep down in Sung knows now that they have to at least try.

The empath reaches over abruptly, putting his hand over the other Phobos’s. They stare at each other for a moment before the other alien nods ever so slowly. “Help us find our Sung.” He says in a unwavering voice. He inclines his head forward then, to Sung, and his grip tightens in response.

“And our Havve.” He says.

And the light is blinding even through his visor and just like that they’re gone.

 

The first thing Meouch hears the sound of surf crashing in.

He startles into awareness, hearing something subtle shift beneath him and then off him. It’s bright to the point of blinding and his eyes have to adjust before he can make sense of what he’s seeing.

The sun reflecting off a seemingly infinite ocean, the horizon unending before his very eyes. There’s sand all over him and once he perks his ears forward he can hear the cry of gulls above head. Meouch gives a violent shake of his head, hoping that’ll get the most of the sand out. “If these fuckers have been having a beach party, I swear…” Gods, there’s even sand in his mouth. “Hey, guys!” He turns his head…

…Only to find no one there.

“Guys…?” Shit okay, no need to panic Meouch. He stands and the sand comes off of him in cascades and gods damn it, now it’s in his shoes and all over his vest and his fur is coated in the damn stuff. “Stupid sand, stupid beach, stupid alternate universe hopping shenanigans.” Meouch begins to growl.

“Oh, there’s no need for that.” A pleasant female voice says from behind him, he turns and there’s a smiling woman there dressed in bright yellow. She quirks her head at him and breaks out into an all too familiar smile and the realization hits.

“ _ Sung?! _ ” He can’t help but yell and she’s smiling even brighter in response, the tan of her skin contrasting with her perfectly white teeth.

“Yup, that’s me!” She twirls. “One of the best ones out there, if I do say so myself.” She cocks out her hip, posing with a great flourish of her arms. “Whaddaya think?”

He can only gape at her, at everything really now that it starts to come into full focus. The sand beneath them is a soft pink that shifts into pearlescent white when the sun hits it, there’s towering palm trees and the whole sky is covered with cotton candy clouds. 

It’s paradise.

“I’ve been looking for you for the past thirty minutes. How in the hell did you end up so far away from your friends?”

“Great question…” He casts one last glance at the ocean, the strange shifting pink and blue of it and the frothy surf it issues before he joins her. “Where in the hell are we?”

“The best place in all of existence.” She throws her hands up. “Lady World!” 

“Lady World?!” Meouch blurts in disbelief and awe. “Uh, I mean, uh… L-Lady World. That’s pretty neat.” Gods, they had made a song about this place and here it was, incredibly real beneath his feet. The female Sung throws her head back with a laugh, the bleached blonde of her hair catching in the sun. 

“Don’t get too excited, Commander Meouch.” She nudges him with a waggle of her eyebrows. She’s got one blue eye and one green and the freckles on her face are actual stars, glowing silver and gold as she laughs even harder. “Now c’mon, I’ve got something to show you.”

As they make their way up the beach Meouch begins to hear people and then he  _ sees _ them. Aliens of shapes and sizes and types, lazing about the beach, jumping into the surf, all smiling so naturally without a care in the world. So far away from that last ‘verse and it’s twining Funk, it’s wet hot misery, away from Boredom’s unreadable gaze.

Paradise...

“Nice, right?” The female Sung hums as she glances up at him. She’s shorter even than their Sung, just under five feet if he’s reading her right. “You ever heard of Halcyonic planets before?”

He tilts his head in question and she looks so excited to be able to tell him. “Halcyonic planets are planets that have reached their full potential. There’s no strife, no war, no struggle. We’re happy here. The whole universe is on it’s way to reaching that point.” Something in her voice goes proud then as she looks out at it all. “It’s a process, but we’ll be there soon enough. It was my race’s legacy…” So she had lost her family then too, just like their Sung. What had that crazy bastard said before on the last planet? Universal constants? “Anyways, enough about that, I have great news, but I feel like I shouldn’t tell you…” She leans in, brows drawing together dramatically. “It’s not my story to share.”

“It’s killing you though, isn’t it?” He offers her a dry smirk which she returns with a groan.

“You have  _ no  _ idea.” 

In the distance now he can see amazing glass buildings raising up between the mountains. They don’t proceed towards any of that though, instead veering off towards a strange tent made of great white sails. There’s small shops here made up of holographic displays on top of the sand and hundreds of beings threading their way through the large space, interacting with the displays with casual ease. “So, to give you some history while we make our way through the bazaar. Here at Lady World, we don’t have money. Anyone can make anything at anytime. Hell, you can do anything you want, whenever you want.” She explains as they slip through the crowds, apologizing with a casual ease as she bumps into a large frog like alien.

“Just like the song…” He mutters to himself and it goes unheard by the female Sung.

“It would surprise you how many people want to go out of their way to make things, to  _ do _ things in worlds like this, but it’s absolutely astounding. It’s that push to create, to explore, to always have something more, but it’s never driven by greed. It’s curiosity, it’s the will of the heart and of the mind.” They’re reaching the back now and the sails slope downwards, creating an effective dead end. “Now where in the heck did they go?” She taps her lip in thought, looking left and right.

“Over here, you dumb bitch!” A fond voice calls. 

“You!” Gods, he’s yelling a lot, but he can’t help it. It’s the one female Meouch he had seen back in the safehouse. She’s got goggles around her neck and the same beach oriented get up as the other Sung does (the morphsuit ending just at the knees, short sleeves, barefoot as well.) But the similarities end there. She’s a lithe cheetah type with, he notices as she turns, just a stump of her tail left. 

“Me!” She says back in a loud, booming voice. “And boy me! Long time no see! I feel so special, now there’s two more of me!” She blinks and splutters a laugh. “Wow, I just rhymed like, three times over. Move over Sung, we’ve got a new songwriter for the group.”

“First off, that will never happen. Second off, there’s just about two of everybody at this point, Meouch.” The female Sung says with a pointed look. Meouch returns said pointed look and it takes a full fifteen seconds before whatever she’s trying to convey hits. The female Sung covers her mouth as she issues a high pitched noise before it turns into one of defeat. “Son of a bitch! I ruined the surprise!” 

“Surprise?” Meouch murmurs back and then it hits him.

They’ve found either the other Sung or their Havve.

“See, you get upset when I call you a dumb bitch, but sometimes you really manage to knock it out of the park Sung.” The female Meouch practically pounces on her friend before she’s rubbing a noogie into the crown of her head, causing Sung to yelp pathetically. 

“You’re the bitch, bitch!” Sung flails uselessly. “A mean awful one who doesn’t deserve my friendship!”

“You know you’ll never ever not be my friend, so shut it.”

“Ladies… I don’t mean to interrupt, but my friends?” He looks between them and feels the word strangle itself out of his throat before he can stop himself. “Please?” Wow, him being the voice of reason? Talk about weird. But how could things  _ not _ be weird in this universe where his band had gone and inverted itself into beings of the female persuasion?

“Oh shit, yeah. C’mon short stuff. Let’s show the man his friends!” The female Meouch loops an arm around him. Sung steams after them, muttering about how her shortness did _ not  _ need to be noted and not everyone could be a tall cat alien like every Meouch, apparently.

“Meouch!” His name is being shouted by none other than his Sung the moment they round a corner. He almost falls over when he finds himself with two armfuls of the shorter male. “YOU DIDN’T DIE!”

“I did not.” He says as he wrangles the empath off of him. It’s good to see him in better spirits but  _ still _ ... “Gods, man, calm down. Yer embarrassin’ me.” His voice goes gruff as he gives the two females a sheepish smile.

“Dude, they’re like, basically us.” Sung says in a low voice, eye narrowed in judgement.

“YOU KNOW, I DISTINCTLY REMEMBER BEING TOLD THAT SOMEONE WAS HERE.” Meouch says in an unnecessarily loud voice. “COULD IT BE OUR FRIEND?!”

Sung’s mouth drops at the corners for a split second but he’s forcing himself to smile but gods, Meouch saw it in that moment.  _ Not Havve, not Havve, not Havve. _ “The other Sung, he’s here. They found him…” There’s a forced happiness there, like Sung  _ needs _ to be happy or he’ll shatter.

“He was hurt.” The female Sung slides up to him and puts comforting hand on his shoulder. Could she be an empath too? Or maybe she’s just good at reading her own tells upon Sung’s face. “We’ve been watching him for the past few hours. He just seems to be in this weird limbo state. Not getting any better but not getting any worse either.”

“Purple Phobos wanted to wait until we found you, just in case… just in case we needed to split up…” A weak noise shudders out of him but he’s shaking his head and giving Meouch a determined look. “But you’re here now, and we’re one step closer to finishing this.” He bites his lower lip. “...Hopefully.”

“Yeah.” He says back, not feeling hopeful in the slightest. “Hopefully.”

He can’t stop staring at the female version of himself.

She’s odd, that’s for sure. A thing that’s not quite liquid, not quite solid either.  _ Solidus _ , Sung had supplied when she had given him the permission to poke her. A strange being made of slime like substance who smiled at him from the bedside, her fingers touching the soft spot at the other Sung’s elbow. “She’s able to monitor most of his vitals like that through osmosis.” The female Meouch had explained. “She’s our little medic, she is.” 

The female Phobos had shrugged her shoulders in that moment, head ducking in embarrassment, going a mix of red and pink through her near translucent skin. The features carved into her being were all soft and feminine. Closed eyes and pursed lips and even a curve of long hair. “She hears through the vibrations in the air too, so that’s how she plays her music and understands us.” The female Sung supplied as she rounded the other side of the bed, brushing the other Sung’s hair back from his closed eyes. 

They were all still sitting around, the crash of the waves distant and oddly comforting. They had checked Havve’s shoulder too and he was now shirtless and without armor, a healing salve pressed against the burn wound (because accidents still happened in a perfect universe, the female Sung had laughed easily when the other Phobos had questioned it.) The other Phobos is watching Sung with all four of his eyes, a strange tenseness about him that the other Meouch had told him not to question the moment it had taken residence up in the purple alien’s shoulders and spine. 

There’s a sound and they all turn and gods, relief floods through him as he spies Sung coming through with their Meouch by his side. “Any changes?” The empath says and the female Phobos shakes her head in response. 

“So tell me again what the hell is going on?” The female Sung takes a seat on the sandy floor, staring up at them all with those blue and green eyes of hers. “I heard something about an anti-Sung?”

“He calls himself Doc Boredom.” Sung takes a seat next to her and pulls his shoes off, letting the sand fall out with a grimace. “He just talked about universal constants, about how… how people kept dying…” He swallows awkwardly. “I think he meant… he meant us. I think every universe has our race dying, doesn’t it?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me.” She brushes the hair back from her face and sighs. “I’m not going to try and speak for you, but I’ve come to a point where I accept that some things had to happen. If it hadn’t, I don’t know if I would have had the drive in me to really change things. We were taking our time, we had accepted that it would be eons, maybe even epochs until we reached a state of halcyon, and now look…” She traces a near complete circle into the rosy sand. “We’re almost there.”

Sung nods every so slowly as he grabs his own handful of sand, watching it shift between his fingers. Phobos sits next to him and Meouch joins and it’s all three of them pressed shoulder to shoulder, the only thing missing was Havve’s ever steadying presence. 

Soon…

“So what can we do to fix their Sung?” He points behind his shoulder. The purple Phobos perks at that before he steps forward as well. “What exactly is happening?”

Phobos watches as their female counterpart draws her hand away from the other Sung’s arm, signing quickly and efficiently. “It’s almost like he’s in a REM state. His body is in full atonia, his heart rate is up alongside his blood pressure, but he’s just not waking up.” The female Sung supplies, her translation nearly perfect.

“So we wake him up?” Phobos says after the pregnant pause that follows. He’s getting all kinds of weird stares at that and he gives an embarrassed noise before curling his antennae in self consciousness. “What?”

“No that’s… that’s good. That could be it.” Havve says. “But it has to be a delicate process, I’m assuming.”

His female counterpart nods and continues to sign her story out. “Think of it like an advanced sleep inertia. The feeling that you experience when you wake up. The inability to process things, to function. You’re basically going to force him out of his deep sleep state and into waking and there may be consequences.” The other Meouch takes up the translation, her head cocking oh so carefully to the side. 

“We can’t wait around.” Meouch says in a low voice. “We’re still looking for our Havve. It’s been seven hours since he disappeared.” They’re all starting to show signs of fatigue too, that much is obvious. “And now with Boredom…”

“Boredom isn’t our problem.” Phobos’s counterpart snaps, causing the female version of them to thread through with a worried blue. He’s even more on edge than what they’ve come to know over the past few hours spent with the strange alien. Sung, it has to the be the fact that he’s not sure what’s going to happen to their Sung. 

“If he’s going to stalk us through space time, I think that’s a problem.” 

“The testerone levels in here are fucking exhausting.” The female Meouch steps between them finally, raising a brow at both of her alternate selves. “You wanna join in too?’ She says to the other Meouch.

“To be honest, I’m getting real tired of it.” He sighs back. “Listen, guys, I know this is has been hard but we’ve got Sung. We’re one step closer to doing what we set out to do in the first place.” The other Meouch tries for a smile but it comes off as more of an awkward grimace. “I think we ought to find a way to wake up our Sung and we get the DL from him. Maybe he was with your Havve, maybe not… we can’t let that chance slip through our fingers.”

“He’s right.” Havve stands and comes over to the bed. “I think… I think I may have an idea as well.” He looks over to their Phobos, sighing some. “You’re not going to like it.”

“Try me.” 

“We should split up.” Oh gods, really? He doesn’t even dare look over at the other Phobos, already knowing how angry he’s going to be at Havve for even  _ suggesting _ that. The darker skinned male is holding up his hands, showcasing the strange lines that decorate his torso. “Hear me out Phobos. It may have to do with his core.”

“Oh damn.” The female Sung breathes. “I bet! That’s probably also why our Phobos can’t get a read on it. It’s specific to your universe!” She snaps her fingers with a tight, eager nod. “But… who’s gonna stay here? Or are you having people jump ahead of you?”

“I’m thinking we stay here.” The other Meouch says. “You should finish healing up, I don’t care how bad you don’t think it is, an injury is still an injury Havve.”

“I’m taking him.” The other Phobos says. “I’ll go by mysel-”

“Oh fuck no you’re not.” The other Meouch gets up in his friend’s face. “You are not going alone. Nobody should be alone at this point.”

Phobos is just about to open his mouth to vouch for himself when Sung stands and speaks. “I’ll go.”

Every eye turns to the empath including all four of the other Phobos’s. He gives a look to Meouch as if to say here we go again, knowing full well how he would react to Sung’s words. “I don’t think it’s best if we travel together.” Phobos says in a low voice. “We haven’t exactly gotten along very well this entire time, Doctor Sung.”

“Bonding experience.” He says before can help himself and the female Phobos brings a hand to her mouth before she goes a bright sunshine yellow in response, her whole form shaking subtly. The other Sung and Meouch join in, their laughter pealing and high at the annoyance on the purple Phobos’s face. 

“What about your Havve? Can’t she come with?” Phobos says almost desperately and suddenly none of the girls are laughing anymore. “What? What did I say?”

“...Havve doesn’t exist in our universe…” The female Sung finally manages. “It wasn’t recent, by any means, but her programming got...corrupted.”

He looks at Sung and sees how pale his friend is, how his eye narrows in disbelief before his whole expression turns to one of pity. “So no,” The female Sung’s voice goes low and rough with the untold story and the memories that shape it. “She… she can’t come with you.” 

Everything goes oddly quiet and Phobos doesn’t know what to say or do. The scary thing was that he could see it happening to their Havve, if he were being completely honest with himself. The robot had moments where he was completely unreadable, where the red of his optics would cast the room in an awful blood red and that favorite knife of his would find its way into his hand with an uncanny quickness in moments of high tension. He could kill, he  _ had _ killed…

“Well then it’s just you and me bud.” Sung claps a hand on the taller alien’s shoulder, breaking the silence. “And my supposedly unconscious alternate universe self.” He grins then and it’s nice to see the empath smiling like that, slowly becoming his usual self again.  

The purple alien rolls all four of his eyes before he gestures that he’s going to pick the other Sung up to their female equivalent, she nods and he makes it look as easy as picking up a bag of feathers. “We’ll make this as quick as possible.” He adjusts the shining Sung in his arms before he looks back at all of them, stern and imposing and everything Phobos had never felt like even once in his life. “If you need to jump anywhere, go to the second universe we went to.” He must be thinking the same thing that occured to Phobos the moment they landed here, the fact that Boredom may very well be following them now across each universe. 

“It was a pleasure to meet you ladies.” Sung says. “And here? Definitely gonna come back and visit this place because it’s everything and more.” He pauses and his eye goes wide. “WAIT, DOES THAT MEAN COMPUTER WIFE IS REAL!?” 

“Oh, she’s real, alright.” The female Meouch says, bringing her paw up to her mouth as she snickers, turning his gaze oh so slowly to the smaller female of the group. “Just ask-” 

Without warning, the female Sung socks her friend right in the gut, causing all of them to jump in surprise.

“Well, you best be on your way!” She says with a forced cheeriness as Meouch collapses to the sand with a pained groan. “Time’s a wastin’ and all that jazz!” 

“...Right…” The other Phobos says slowly, casting a look in Sung’s direction with a questioning quirk of his brows. Sung only gives a very subtle shake of his head before he’s smiling once more. “Well, I suppose this is goodbye for now.”

Their eyes meet and Phobos remembers how he had be drawn to the other in the chaos of their house hours earlier. Fates, fates had drawn them together somehow. “Take care of him.” He says, tipping his head towards Sung without a hint of subtly. Sung starts to protest but he glares at his friend until he goes quiet. “I mean it.”

“I second that..” Meouch’s voice is a bored drawl but there’s something in his eyes, a silent threat as he stares the other Phobos down.

“Guys, I can take care of myself…” Sung mumbles but Phobos isn’t done yet.

“I know we didn’t get the greatest start, but we’re in this together.” His words go tight at the end and he has to press down on his chest and pause for a moment, gathering both his thoughts and his breath. “I don’t know if it’s the same for either of you,” He looks at the other Meouch and then the other Phobos once more. “But Sung is the reason we are who we are.” He looks at both groups. “We wouldn’t… wouldn’t be the people we are without him, the friends we are without him, so please… just as I’ll know he’ll take care of you, take care of him.” Oh gods, his lungs  _ burn _ . He manages a hollow gasp before he’s scrambling for his helmet, pulling it down over his head and activating the respirators without a moment’s hesitation.

It’s quiet then in the wake of his words, broken only by the sound of a whimper-sniff that belongs to Sung before the empath is full out bawling. “PHOBOS!” Sung shrieks before the empath is leaping at him. “I COULD NEVER ASK FOR A BETTER FRIEND AND YOU’RE SO NICE AND WONDERFUL AND PINK! AND I DON’T KNOW WHY I SAID YOU WERE PINK BUT YOU ARE AND-AND-!” Oh gods, now Sung’s hugging him and he really can’t breathe! Not to mention he’s blubbering like a mad man and Meouch is groaning under his breath at the whole spectacle. “AND MEOUCH YOU’RE AMAZING TOO, EVEN WHEN YOU’RE BEING AN ASSHOLE.”

“I’M NOT AN ASSHOLE, YOU LITTLE SHIT.” Meouch barks back. “FUCK YOU!”

“Wow, it really is like looking in a mirror. A masculine mirror, mind you...” The female Sung notes in a soft voice. “This is so weird, but I love it.”

“Sung, please…” He squeaks out finally from behind his helmet. “I can’t breathe!”

“Oh shit!” The empath drops him. “I almost killed you!” Oh gods, not the tears again. He quickly waves his hands about before putting them on either side of Sung’s face, squishing his cheeks. 

“No more crying.” He rasps.

“...No more crying...” He says back in a wrecked voice.

“Thank the gods.” Meouch mutters under his breath. “Holy shit, are  _ you _ crying?!”

“It’s just a very emotional and touching moment.” The other Meouch pipes up in a weak voice, wiping at his eyes with his paws. “Shut up! Leave me alone!”

“You are all a terrible, horrible embarrassments.” Havve says in a flat voice before he smiles. “And I wouldn’t have it any other way.” 

His counterpart face is ducked down, a high color staining his cheeks. Oh. Did he embarrass the other? Phobos’s own face goes hot behind his helmet but then he shakes it off. Forget that. He had spoken the truth and he had meant it. “You’ll be fine.” He says. “We’re survivors, you and I.”

Their female equivalent nods and puts a comforting hand on his shoulder, signing slowly, her body made up a hopeful sky blue. 

“ _ And I as well _ .” Her fingers and palms spell out. “ _ And many more _ .”

“Right…” He shifts the other Sung in his grip before he manages a sigh, one that speaks of weariness and of want. “I suppose it’s time for us to go, Doctor Sung.”

“After you, Lord Phobos.” He’s strapping on his pylon with a winning smile tossed in his own direction, causing Phobos to grin behind his helmet’s visor. “Now don’t have too much fun while we’re gone. That means  _ you _ Meouch. No flirting.”

“Fuck off, don’t tell me what do, you tiny man.” 

“I’m the leader of the group, and I say-!”

“Out! Out, out, out!” The female Sung goes behind the other Phobos and Sung and begins to push them. “Off my planet! Begone!”

“Begone? Oh I like that. I’m going to start using that!” Sung says as the other Phobos pulls out the Device, carefully balancing the other Sung as he does. “Begone. Begone! Be _ gone _ ! Begone?” Phobos can’t help but laugh at the annoyed groan his counterpart issues. “BEGONE!”

And in a flash of light they manage to do just that.

Be  _ gone _ .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEY IM SORRY I DIDNT POST THIS I WAS DRIVING TO CANADA AND THEN THE ALBUM DROPPED AND I'VE BEEN CRYING FOR AN HOUR STRAIGHT BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT I DO  
> CRY
> 
> um  
> gonna do my best to post the chapter before the concert tomorrow  
> thank you again for reading it really does mean a lot   
> i wouldn't be who i was without any of you  
> the good and the bad  
> all of it  
> thank you.


	6. Chapter 6

It’s another one of those universes where they appear as is. No momentary lapse in time in which they found themselves on the ground, no waking up from some strange state. Still, it takes a moment for his senses to adjust to their surroundings. Pleasantly cool, just bordering on cold the moment a breeze picks up with a soft wind whistle song through the trees. “This is…?”

“This is it.” Phobos says. He looks at the male in his arms, the way his chest rises and falls, his hair a muted opal fire upon his brow. “We’ve got a ways to walk though.”

He reaches into the bag on his hip and holds out a granola bar to the other alien. “Well it’s a good thing I brought snacks.” He says with a soft smile. Operation make a new friend had begun. Sure it had been a rough start, but Sung was still eager to fix it. 

After a moment’s hesitation Phobos takes the bar from him and rips it open with his teeth. “Can you sense if anything or anyone is here?” He asks through a mouthful. Sung pulls his pylon off and closes his eye, letting his senses reach out as far as they can. Please don’t let it be like the first ‘verse, please don’t let it be like the first ‘verse…

“Animals…” He says after a moment, just as surprised by the information as the other Phobos is. “Just… animals…” Baser emotions of want and fear and survival coursing through each of them, a cacophony of baser instincts. “Nothing else from what I can tell.” Sung says as he straps his pylon back on.

“That’s good.” Phobos shifts the other Sung’s weight in his arms. “We’re heading towards the mountain.” Mountain? Sung has to go up on his tiptoes to spy the tip and even then it’s barely visible from where he is, the strange trees around them creaking loudly, leaning towards it almost…

“Well, let’s get going!”

It’s a quiet walk for some time. He busies himself with thinking of questions he can ask the purple alien but each one comes up awkwardly at the end, unsure of itself. “So…” He finally says after a moment. “You uh, a fan of Oreos?”

“...What?” 

“O-Oreos! Do you have Oreos in your-”

“YES WE HAVE OREOS IN OUR UNIVERSE, SUNG.” The other Phobos snaps viciously. He draws in a sharp breath through his nose and closes all four of his eyes. He rubs at his temple before he’s continuing forward, the question unanswered and Sung feeling even more miserable than before. The other is strangely unreadable to him, every thought and action a mystery even with his core. There was the obvious anger and fear, but if Sung deeper he could get a sense of how the other wanted to right the situation. Under that? Regret on how he was even here. Trouble. All this was was trouble…

“I’m sorry.” Sung finally says. It feels like it should be saved for a life or death situation but it needs to be said now before he goes and pisses the other male off any further. “I feel like all I’ve done this entire time is antagonize you and cause you problems and all you’ve done is be actually level headed. You actually wanted to plan everything out and I just- I just took it and ran. Literally, at one point mind you.” The strap of his pylon feels tight across his throat and he wants nothing more than to take it off but he keeps it on with his gaze straight forward, almost too nervous to look at the purple alien at this point. 

The other Phobos stays silent and now he’s really starting to sweat under that morphsuit of his. This isn’t your Phobos, Sung, this is a different Phobos made out of different consequences and experiences. 

He’s something else completely. 

Just like Boredom.

“...What do you think made him like that…” Sung says and without even giving context Phobos goes stiff with it. “That  _ broken _ ?”

“You saw him, so you would know better.” The other’s words temper themselves. He does look then, taking in the other’s purple skin and the way his face is turned up towards the sun, which has begun it’s slow descent into what will soon become the nighttime sky. “What did he say to you?”

“He didn’t outright state it, but it sounded like everything stemmed from the fact that his race-” Our race, he ought to say, but he can’t. It was already hard enough to say it before in Lady World. “- _ Had _ to die. Even the universe I went to with Danny, that was  _ literally _ the lore that was written up. Doctor Sung’s parents die of boredom. You and Meouch fight, though listen to this.” He breaks out into a hint of a smile. “At one point Havve was found inside of Phil Collins’s toilet.”

“Who’s toilet?” Phobos says, incredulous.

“YOU DON’T KNOW WHO PHIL COLLINS IS?!” Sung nearly shrieks and a flock of birds goes up and flying into the sky with it. Phobos hisses out a quiet warning, quickly glancing down at the man in his arms before looking back up again. “...S-sorry, it was an appropriate reaction though, g-given the information.”

“You are… something else.” He shakes his head slowly. “You’re so different from him.” The other Sung, he means. 

“Well you’re so different from Phobos.” He says simply and something changes in the other male’s expression. “What?”

“Nothing. Don’t worry about it, let’s keep going. I don’t want to be out in the dark.” Everything’s turning golden as the sun sinks even further in the sky. Something shifts in the undergrowth and a towering creature with antlers appears through the trees, five luminous eyes blinking at Sung absently before it disappears into the forest once more. 

“Holy shit.” He breathes out before he’s racing after Phobos.

He is thinking about it now though, about Boredom’s drive, the thing that was causing him to go after this so desperately to the point of madness. 

To the point of killing countless other versions of themselves across different universes, supposedly.

The mountain looms ever closer and it’s becoming much more quiet with every step they take. He touches his core absently, feeling how hot it’s becoming in his chest, grimacing as it begins to burn almost. “So what does this place have to do with his core?” He can tell the other Phobos is grateful for an actual question that he can answer for once. 

“Sung’s never gone into full detail with us, but of course it boils down to him being curious.” A fond smile takes residence upon his features as he begins to speak, looking down at the sleeping male. “Started exploring around this planet, found it by complete accident. Maybe he was drawn here, maybe he wasn’t. There’s somewhere deep in the mountain, a room of sorts… It’ll make more sense when we get there.” He looks over at Sung, left brow quirking as he sees the fingers on his core. “Yourself?”

“Ah… the good ol’ ‘light to guide in the dark.’” He taps the core and it flickers in response. “It’s a bit similar to what the last female Sung mentioned. My kind was made to stave off universal entropy by bringing balance. We can hear the stars, sing to them.” Yeah, this one was always a doozy. Better to just power through it rather than take it slow. “I should be able to, at least.” His cheeks flush then. “I-I panicked when I was younger and fucked it up. When I found my parents, I… tried to kill myself. Knife right into the core. Universe didn’t want that though. Up and grabbed me and threw me and Havve into another universe.”

Phobos is finally recovering from the slew of words he just threw at the purple alien. “Is your Havve like you?”

“Ah, no. I uh, I  _ built _ our Havve.” 

Phobos’s brows really raise at that. “The Ennui was a corruption that we spread within ourselves without trying. We’re empaths, we feel what the other person feels. This?” He taps his pylon. “We didn’t have anything like this in our planet. We had our walls, but we didn’t like to use those anyways because we all trusted and loved one another, and then hell… we just didn’t want to because of the disease. Why bother, you know? What was the point? And that’s how it spread. The perfect storm.”

A lone bird cry sounds across the brilliant sky and he waits for it to finish it’s low and mournful song before continuing. “So I decided to build a receptacle to store everything we were feeling, but then I-” His jaw clenches. “I started to feel it, the Ennui. There wasn’t any rush, there wasn’t any reason to keep working as hard as I was. Gods, he was  _ this _ close, you know? All I had to do was just…” He rubs the bottom of his jaw, a low sigh coming out of him and that’s when he hits it. The wall. The last one still within his mind after all these years. “I woke up in this cave and I couldn’t think straight and the most logical thing was to just store my memories inside of him. I couldn’t take it. The pain, the guilt…I blacked out and woke up again and that’s when my ‘new life’ began, in the snow, both of us covered in someone else’s blood. The telepathic link? That’s because Havve has a part of me inside of him. Hell, he’s who he is because I gave him the capacity to feel. Slowly over time my memories came back but there’s still bits and pieces, and the star singing thing? I haven’t been able to grasp it yet either…”

By now Phobos is just staring at him in astonishment. He shrugs his shoulders, his light armor moving with it. “I just want to find him.” His voice goes very very small in that moment. “That’s all I want.”

The purple alien snorts and Sung’s surprised by it. “W-what?” Here he had poured his heart out to the other and this is what he got? Gods, he just couldn’t win with this guy, could he? His cheeks really start to go red and Sung’s starting to feel stupid for even bringing it up when he sees Phobos give a rueful shake of his head. “Dude, c’mon, just-”

“Sometimes it’s scary how similar you two are.” He says softly.

“Me and him, that’s not-”

“No, not our Sung.” Phobos’s lashes flutter and he’s tipping his head up to the golden twilight above them. “Deimos.”

He had heard their Phobos say that name a handful of times, always with a misery and regret so strong that Sung almost couldn’t handle it. Apparently this Phobos had one too. “I look at you and I see him and I think about everything that happened. How I couldn’t even stop it.” The purple alien is such a strange sight to look at with the other male in his arms, face still angled towards the sky with all four eyes closed, now tight with the memory of pain. “I told you earlier that you’re so different from our Sung, but I still… I see bits and piece of him in you too, and that’s what makes it so hard. My planet? My best friend? And now I don’t even know if this is going to work and I’m scared.” He draws in a shuddering breath and suddenly tears begin to leak from all four of his eyes. “And then you run off and I can’t help but think about everything that I’ve already let happen because I wasn’t fast enough, because I wasn’t there, and that’s why I get upset and I’m sorry that I’ve let that come between us.”

“You couldn’t help any of that, Phobos.” He lays a hand on the other’s forearm. “But I know more than anyone, and I’m sure he does too, that it still hurts despite all that.” 

“Yeah.” Phobos manages in a tight voice. “Yeah, you’re right.” 

“But I know this too. We’re going to fix this. We’re so close. So let’s… let’s start over again. From the top.” Sung steps away. “Hi there, I’m Doctor Sung.”

Phobos sniffs and shakes his head but a small smile is beginning to tug at his lips. “Hello Doctor Sung, my name is Lord Phobos.”

“Lord Phobos! Well, I have a friend named Lord Phobos!” He puts his hands on his hips and grins. “And what about your friend?”

“W-Well that’s the funny thing.” A hiccupy wet laugh leaves the purple alien in response. “His name is Doctor Sung too.”

“Well I’ll be damned!” He chortles, literally putting on the most over the top expression he can manage until the other Phobos is laughing uncontrollably, his cheeks dusted in violet. “WHAT A FINE NAME THAT IS!”

“I would have to agree, it is a good name.” 

A cool voice comes from the trees and suddenly they’re both no longer laughing because that’s Boredom...

Boredom is here.

 

“What’s with the face?” Phobos’s eyes flick to Sung and the other looks sucker punched by the sight of his corrupted counterpart. “Didn’t you miss me?” He draws his hands to his core, his voice going saccharine as he takes another step towards them.

“Go.” Sung says under his breath and it takes a moment for Phobos to realize that those words are meant for  _ him _ . Sung’s left leg is sliding behind him as he assumes a fighting stance, his head cocked towards Boredom. “Now.”

But there’s no time to because the other Havve, the one that must have attacked the other Phobos and taken their Sung is slowly making his way forward too, knife drawn and at the ready.

“I really do want to apologize for our last meeting. That’s not at all how I wanted this to all start.” Boredom drawls as his cape trails behind him on the forest floor, the setting sun behind him highlighting all of his strangely familiar edges.

“This?” Phobos says in a low voice. Stall. He needs to stall until one of them can manage to come up with a plan to get to the mountain. Sung’s weight in his arms is suddenly that much heavier and there’s so much to account for, to consider…

“Well, _ this _ of course.” He gestures to them lazily. “Now don’t get too full of yourselves, I don’t just mean you two and your friends. I mean this meeting of selves, the interdimensional travel, the pure fact that the universe didn’t rip itself asunder.” His smile widens and it’s awful in the growing dark. “ _ That’s _ what I mean.”

“But what’s the point?” Sung says in a low voice. “Why do you even care?” The other Havve is circling them, the glaring brightness of his red eyes causing Phobos’s eyes to narrow to a near squint. 

“I was bored.” Boredom says in a monotone before he throws his head back with a loud laugh, his entire body jerking with the terrible cawing sound. “Bad joke, bad joke! No, no no no, it was more meaningful than that. Don’t look so upset over there!” The other male tuts, waggling his finger at them. Phobos can see it, the bit of Sung still left inside of Boredom. It’s in the way he smiles, in the movements, in the way each step is filled with confidence. The performer’s walk- always putting on a show.

Boredom lets his head fall back with a sigh and he gestures for his Havve to join him. It’s strange how fitting the robot looks next to the man in almost all black. He had always looked somewhat strange among them, hadn’t he? Towering and sharp edged and cryptic, silent and imposing, a force to be reckoned with.

But that wasn’t really Havve.

No, their Havve was quiet and soft spoken and had a knack for quips. He was a being made up on his own circumstances and choices and dreams too. Same for the other Havve that they had been chasing through this whole day. Sung had created him sure, but he had become his own being, his own self…

“You’ve been thinking about it, haven’t you?” Boredom says, drawing Phobos’s attention and causing Sung to go stiff.

“Universal constants.” They say in unison and it’s eerily like the moment in the house from hours ago when the empath had smiled at their Sung and they had cheered the word in perfect time with one another.

“Things that simply  _ are _ across space time. Requirements, let’s call them. Mathematical equations, physical quantities, anthropopathic principles. You know, the usual.” Boredom hums. “But it’s not just math and numbers and all things intangible, is it Doctor Sung? It’s things that we experience, things we see over and over and over again. Things that can’t be helped, things that simply must occur because the universe and the stars willed it.” His voice begins to roughen with each passing word that passes his lips. “The possibilities of something or someone becomes null and void because of what? What’s the reason? What’s the point? Why does it need to happen every time!”

His voice breaks on the last word and it echoes around them across the now silent forest. “Every universe that exists and it happens over and over and over again.” And it’s then that Phobos begins to understand what this rant is all about.

It’s about Sung’s race dying of boredom no matter what.

In universes where you could find Phobos’s planet alive and well, in universes where they were simply just humans with too much free time on their hands and penchant for making jams, in universes where everything was supposed to be perfect this was  _ still _ the reality of it. The  _ actuality _ of it. Maybe it was a catalyst, maybe it was a necessity, but whatever it was it was clear Boredom was done with it. 

“Did you know that some Devices have functions that are unique to their universe?” Boredom notes in a low voice as his visored stare slides over to Phobos once more. “Yours powers your ship, correct?” Phobos feels a chill root itself deep within him at the other male’s words. He  _ knew _ . Had he been observing them? For how long? His eyes glance to the other Sung and he’s got his own horrified look on his face. “And that’s the thing. It allows you to travel great lengths, great distances, things that wouldn’t be capable in your universe otherwise.”

And he was right. There was other space travel means out there, but there’s had always been one step ahead seemingly, helping them outrace all kinds of trouble and reach new and strange places before anyone else could. “It’s rare, but it’s possible, and so why wouldn’t there be a Device out there that could do the one thing I needed most? So I set out to find it.”

“Time travel.” Sung supplies in a monotone voice and Boredom is nodding all too eagerly at that. 

“So, what? You go back, you keep your race from dying, then what?” Phobos bites out, hugging his Sung that much closer. It couldn’t be just that. It had to be something more, something that only Boredom himself could make sense of.

“Not just mine. Every Sung ever.” 

He’s smiling and it’s tragically beautiful. It’s the kind of smile that’s accented by the way Boredom throws his arms out wide, the way it comes to his face so naturally in that moment. How damn proud it is. Fixer, Sung  _ fixed  _ things… “There’s no reason that they had to-”

“You don’t know that.” Sung says then in an impossibly loud voice. It rings out in the air and comes back to them on an infinite echo, filling the silence over and over again. “There’s no way you could know that. No way to measure the consequences!”

“Are you telling me you wouldn’t want them back?” Boredom hisses and suddenly there’s no space between the two. “Your family? Your friends?”

“Gods, don’t…” His voice is barely above a whisper. “Don’t do that.”

“Then tell me why I wouldn’t, why I  _ shouldn’t _ , Doctor Sung.”

There’s inches between them and Sung closes it with his fist, catching Boredom right in his mouth. Another fist then, slamming right into the other man’s stomach, pummeling him back a whole five steps. “Maybe it’s synchronicity. Maybe it’s a gods damned causality, but whatever it is… it’s not yours to change, you son of a bitch!” Sung roars at Boredom’s stunned face, at the blood that spills over his lip. There’s nothing and then-

Chaos.

Havve moves and Sung just catches the robot, his foot connecting with his uncovered side, causing him to crash into Boredom, still winded and trying to come back from his shock. Sung’s head turns just so in his direction and the pointed look he gives him is obvious in that moment.

_ Go. _

Suddenly his Sung feels infinitely heavier in his arms and he can’t move. He  _ can’t. _ He had promised to take care of the other Sung and here he was, two on one-ing Boredom and his twisted Havve. It’s obvious what will happen the moment he puts down his Sung though. One of them will take him hostage and that’s it… no going back from that. 

So Phobos makes a decision.

There’s a moment where the punches and kicks lull and that’s when Phobos manages to drag Sung back. The empath lets out a surprised squawk and he almost punches him in response but Phobos is faster, simply hefting Sung’s sleeping weight into his counterparts arms. “Go.” He says the word on a hissed whisper. “It knows Sung.”

“Phobos, no, I-”

“Go!”

Sung hesitates and it’s nearly the end of them. Suddenly Havve’s bearing down and it’s only chance that Phobos’s hand comes up in time, catching the wrist that’s holding the knife and twisting it until it drops. “GO.”

They share one last look before Sung finally gets the hint and runs.

 

His chest hurts.

It’s his lungs and it’s his core too. The strange embedded light pulses painfully and even his pylon can’t keep out the near clamor of dissonant emotions that seem to chase him all the way to the mountain. Phobos’s determination in the face of seemingly impossible odds, the other Havve’s all consuming need to rend and to destroy, and the his counterpart, desperate and wanting…

And gods, he had felt it too.

To go back and fix it all. To save them all. He had had similar wants, similar dreams that he had woken from gasping until Havve’s voice was finally able to reach him on their seemingly tenuous link. 

_ You’re here now _ . Havve would simply say. Here, in this moment, in this world where he had failed and yet it had led to all of this. It matched what his female counterpart had said as well, and even the words he had forced out of his own mouth minutes earlier. A synchronicity was simply the fact that everything happened for a reason, a causality being the cause and effect of it all.

Things that could happen versus things that needed to happen.

Potentiality and actuality.

The other Sung simply sleeps on his arms, his chest rising and falling oh so slowly. For a moment Sung can only stare at the other version of himself, letting it all catch up to him. You’re here now Sung, for a reason that may be unknown to you but a reason all the same. 

He’s taking those final steps that lead him to the very foot of the mountain then. It’s inexplicably large, the kind of things you read of in stories and legends. For a moment he stands at the base and nothing happens, causing something inside of him to plummet. No. This can’t be it. Failure couldn’t be that easy after all of this. He thinks then of the Device, of how he had to ask it of what he needed. 

Maybe, just maybe...

“Please.” Sung says to the mountain, face glancing up towards the stars that are just beginning to emerge above head. His core goes hot in his chest in response and he gives a pained gasp, almost dropping the other Sung. “Gods, please just… give me this.” Phobos had said it would know their Sung but he was lost to them now, wasn’t he? Adrift among dreams and safe from harm. “Please.” 

Just like that a star shoots across the sky. And then another, and another, and then it’s tens and hundreds of them and he’s never felt something so strange before. A weightlessness yes, but also…

A sense of rightness. 

Of  _ belonging _ . 

“ _ Hello, star singer _ .” Something hums through the quiet. “ _ We’ve been waiting so long. _ ”

The mountain groans and the ground shakes and the tears that had been gathering in his eye slip down his cheek in surprise at it all. He sees it then, the cave made of circuits that leads into the heart of the mountain, lighting up the moment he approaches as the other Sung’s core brightens in response.

Still, he doesn’t step inside quite yet. He looks up to the sky now filled with comet trails and infinite stardust as the full understanding comes over him. “...I’m sorry I made you wait.” He says in a soft voice. “I never knew…”

“ _ You do, and it will come to you with time _ .” They sigh in a sweet soft voice. “ _ There’s no rush, we can wait a while longer. _ ” They go bright and winking then with a laughter so joyous that Sung can’t help but smile in return, the tears coming a bit more freely. “ _ Now go on, wake the dreamer, there’s much to be done _ .”

He enters the cave and everything goes quiet once more but it’s something that brings relief rather than worry. This was somewhere safe. A sanctuary. 

What a strange place it is though, with circuits running through the walls like veins of ore, lighting the path as he travels further in. “Got a lot to tell you when you wake up.” He murmurs to the other. “We might also have to fight our evil self, so get ready for that.” He tries to laugh then but it doesn’t come off as easily as he would like it to. There’s still the question of why the other Sung was sleeping in the first place. Had he gotten away, or maybe just maybe… the other Havve had let him go? “Also hoping you’re gonna be able to tell me where my best friend is. That’d be nice.” He adds quietly.

He almost doesn’t even notice it until they’ve just about run into the gilt door that fills the end of the hallway, coming up just short of it and it’s looming presence. “Well, this is extra.” He says after a moment of observation before a snort escapes him. Gods, this was  _ so _ not the time to laugh but Sung can’t help it. Something normal in the face of singing stars and glowing mountains and an evil counterpart set on changing the course of space time itself. “Alright, let’s just uh… open the door and uh, hopefully… not die.” He gulps audibly. “Not dying would be nice.”

Sung simply pushes his palm against the door and it opens inwards to an unreadable darkness. He touches his core and it brightens just so, lighting the way as he steps inside. Throne room. That’s really the only way to describe it. High vaulted ceilings and a chair in the center of it all. 

The other Sung’s core is bright to the point of blinding and he has to squint his eye under his visor. “I’m just… just gonna put you here.” Gods, please don’t let anything bad happen. He approaches the chair and hesitates for just a moment before he oh so gently place his other self upon it. And of course-

Nothing happens.

He hums in annoyance under his breath before he adjusts the other Sung so he’s sitting up more. They didn’t have time to wait around for something to happen, not with Phobos back there all alone, not with Boredom hot on their trail. “C’mon dude, everyone’s waiting for you.” Still nothing. He undoes the clasp on his pylon and takes it off, letting it fall to his feet unceremoniously as he stares at the other. Maybe it was something to do with his core, maybe it was as simple as touching his core and...

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” A voice says from behind him.

Sung goes very, very still.

“And after all, I’m kind of you.”

He turns and feels the breath leave him a sudden rush because yes, it’s Boredom, but the other’s pylon is off as well and it really is like looking at himself.

Except for the blind eye.

“Oh this thing? Yeah, kind of an eye sore, isn’t it?” His lips pull at the corners into what looks like an almost painful smile at the joke. “I manage to get around though, so it isn’t the worst.”

“How can you…” Sung starts but Boredom’s cutting him off.

“Extrasensory perception. Came with some experimentation, wasn’t always like this. This was, of course, after everyone died.” He forces the casualness and once again Sung’s hit by that tangled mess of emotions that runs through the other male. “So it’s not perfect. Sometimes I can read thoughts, sometimes I can feel other’s emotions like you can, sometime it’s just increased intuition. That’s why I wasn’t able to find you again right away, but we’re here now, aren’t we?”

That they were and what was to show for it? Havve still missing, Sung still asleep, and what of Phobos? “So what now? Now that we’re here. Why follow us? Why not some other TWRP out there?” What made them so gods damned special?

“Well that’s the funny thing, see… you have my Device.” A pause as Boredom spreads his arms out wide, fingers splaying out as he smiles. “And I have yours.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IM GOING TO SEE TWRP TONIGHT AND IM YELLING IN THE CLUB LIKE AAAA  
> Enjoy the chapter, we're almost to the end of this wild and crazy ride and it's been such a pleasure to write this and experience this.


	7. Chapter 7

“What?”

It made sense that the broken Device in his hip bag was Boredom’s. It had taken them to that dead ‘verse hours and hours ago, desperately seeking out it’s origins Sung supposes, but it’s the other’s latter words that cause him to cock his head in question.

“Oh, you didn’t know?” He’s drawing his hands back in and giving Sung this look. Overly sympathetic and not sincere in the slightest, in fact it’s more akin to gloating. “It’s Havve.”

“ _What_?” The word leaves him again except this time it’s strangled with disbelief.

“Well that’s oversimplifying it. Havve has your Device inside of him. That’s what caused this all to start. Two Devices interacting with each other. That’s why I’m suggesting you don’t touch that one’s core. You never know...”

“But he didn’t-” Sung’s ignoring as the other rambles on but Boredom’s all too ready to get back on topic.

“Do you know that?”

What happened in those hours where he had been asleep back at home? He should have known, should have known something was wrong, but they were all on edge from their first interaction with the Device that Sung hadn’t thought anything of it, none more than Havve...

Oh gods, he feels sick with the realization.

Boredom may have been on the move before they had the Device, but he really had started all of this.

“Now I don’t know how or why he ended up with it.” Boredom tips his head with an easy sigh. “But I’m sure the answers will come soon enough, after all, I saw the little show you put on earlier. Very impressive!” He claps his hands before leveling Sung with a hard look. “And to think you don’t want them back...”

Them. Starkeepers and singers like him, his family, his people. Sung stares right at Boredom, eye going tight with anger. “Guilt tripping me isn’t going to get you what you want.”

“It isn’t just me though. It’s every Sung at least once. Even you thought of it! What could I have done differently? What could I do to change it? We’re not alone either. Think of Phobos! Every Phobos ever could be like those select few. It’s only fair.”

“Gods, it’s not about being fair, Boredom, it’s about…” He hesitates and that’s enough to get the other up in his face.

“What’s it about, Doctor Sung?” He says in a deathly low voice, lip curling with an undeniable fury.

“It’s just how it is.” Damn the Fates, hang the gods, curse the stars… whatever it may be, it simply _was_.

“But it doesn’t have to be. We can change this, together. It doesn’t just have to be us either, we can wake him up, have him join…” Sung glances back at the other Sung, still sleeping on and on. “We all miss them, all regret it, so let’s just-” Boredom smiles and it’s the most real one he’s seen his counterpart manage since they met. “Fix this, together.”

“Together.” Sung says in a soft voice as Boredom’s brightening with a twisted hope, with a sense of victory and righteousness surging through his veins. “Let’s go back, together.”

He moves like lightning before Boredom can even realize what’s happening, one hand drawing out the broken Device and the other coming down upon the other’s shoulder. The other Sung sleeps on on the chair and he manages an apologetic wince before he’s looking back at Boredom again. Hell, this probably won’t even work, there’s no way that it even should, but a broken Device is something else entirely than it’s original intent.

And besides, he has the stars on his side.

Go back. He wills it. Take us back. I don’t even want to change it I just want to _see_ -!

There’s a crackle of blue that lances out around them and Boredom can only give a startled gasp as the Device sparks once, twice…

And then they’re gone.

 

“Sung! Hey Sung!”

He turns but he doesn’t turn. Someone else turns and he follows the motion of it (torso twisting, feet crossing over one another, face curving) until he realizes what’s going on.

He’s here but not here.

He’s, for lack of better words, a ghost.

This is nothing like his world. While his memories may still be hazy there was still bits and pieces of it. Two moons hanging in the night sky, the Symposium where his keytar and synthesizer had called out to him from across it’s innumerable halls, the songbirds in every open window home. There was nothing to hide there so no door went locked and there was always a sense that you could go and do anything, an openness that was completely and utterly undeniable.

But this...

This was a city.

It wasn’t like Lady World either where the buildings were ringing crystal shining in the sun. This was _industrial_. Dark glass lit up from the inside, iron and concrete, alarmingly like LA if not for the fact that when he looked up they went on forever and ever, disappearing into the dark clouds above.

“Sung! We’re gonna be late!”

Another child with a light in their chest wearing all black waves at him from a building corner. He moves then and Sung can’t help but follow, his body tethered to this strange younger version of his other self. Boredom, this was Boredom… did that mean that the present Boredom was also experiencing the same thing he was, or was he freely roaming about the city? Gods, was he even here at all? There’s no time to think about that though, not when the younger Boredom begins to race between the buildings, a sense of belonging coursing through him.

“Did you do the course work?”

“Why, do you need to copy?”

“Maybe…”

“This is the last time!”

“You say that _every_ time!”

It’s all meaningless chatter between school boys, the two of them filled with boundless energy and racing thoughts. Sung begins to tune it out, trying to get a sense of where the stars are in the sky, trying to see if he can speak to them once more, but it’s nothing…

The same _nothing_ from before.

Oh gods, this was the dead ‘verse in the midst of becoming just that.

Did they know? They _had_ to. Boredom as he is right now isn’t a good point of reference because of course you never told children these things. It was the kind of secret you whispered behind closed doors, the kind that adults held heavy in their hearts until it finally all boiled over and they broke like gods damned dams.

Sung knew.

He had been there once.

He tries to pull away but he’s stuck with the other apparently, watching as the day plays out. Their classroom is no more than fifteen students in a large room with windows that look out to endless gray clouds. Later on, Boredom takes his lunch in a room several floors above where he shows a pretty girl that he can actually remove the window pane and they can sit with their feet dangling out over the clouds as they talk, the toes of their shoes coming back misted and squeaking on the floor when a tone rings out announcing that lunch hour was over.

The end of the school day can’t come quicker but at least he’s seeing Boredom for who he really was before all this. He’s a smart little thing with a quicksilver tongue and a penchant for getting in trouble with the teacher, something Sung could relate to all too well. He even manages to hold hands with the girl from before all the way to Tower Ten where she lives, leaving his POS friend behind (Boredom’s words, specifically.) It’s after he drops her off (too nervous to kiss her cheek like he wants to, the need burning in his small heart all the same) that the younger Boredom finally makes the trek towards him home.

Tower Zero.

Up, up, up they go until they reach the penthouse where a feline creature with six legs and a split tail rubs up against his leg in greeting when he walks inside, it’s three eyes blinking up at Boredom. “C’mere you.” He says to the cat, picking it up with a happy sigh. “Are they in the lab? One blink for yes, two for no.” Three blinks again and Boredom lets out an over exaggerated groan. “You’re no help!”

The cat chirrups and wriggles out of his arms, leading the way further into the apartment. It really is nice here, all modern and sleek, but there’s still that sense of wrongness… like they knew they didn’t have the time make it lived in. It was all, it seemed, for the sake of appearances.

Boredom, of course, notices it without really noticing. It’s more about the fact that his parents spent more time in the lab than they did with him, but he got it… sort of…. They just had a big project, something that had been assigned to them by the Chancellor, and when that was done they’d be a big happy family again.

Just like old times.

It’s all starting to come together. Gods, Sung doesn’t even know if he can stay through the rest of this, but he doesn’t have any choice does he? He has to let it all play out, let it all happen as it did long, long ago. A universe dying, two parents racing against time itself to figure out the cure for Boredom. Everyone else had to be long gone and this was the last bastion of them all.

Oh to be alone in the universe… to be damned and scared and completely helpless.

No wonder Boredom wanted to change it all.

“You understand now, right?”

The empty dinner table that the younger Boredom sits at all by his lonesome fades away and suddenly it’s just the two of them an infinitely black space, the light of their cores the only thing keeping them from complete darkness. “I found them that night, dead, hours later. They had had so much exposure to it that it was only logical at that point. I was the one who had to inform the Chancellor. And then you know what happened, Doctor Sung?”

He shakes his head even though he has an inkling of an idea. Boredom gives a dry laugh and runs a hand through his hair. “They assigned Havve to me and they told me that it was my duty to find the cure. Havve was there for one of two reasons, to tell them the moment I found it, or to tell them… tell them I had died as well…”

Gods, what did you do- What did you _say_ in a situation like this? His own desperation to store the Ennui away comes back to him and suddenly it’s all too hard to swallow past the knot in his throat. “That’s how this happened... “ He points to his eye. “I just… I started to get sloppy, I fucked up a few times, people were starting to get sick.” A memory of his friend and the girl flash across his memories and Boredom’s miserable with it. “So that’s why… that’s why I want to change this. We deserve more, Sung. More than this. More than pain, more than this struggle over and over again. So please.” Boredom drops to his knees, his knee pads taking the brunt of his weight. “Please…”

It’s the most sane he’s seen the other and he almost says yes, but then Sung draws himself up to his fullest height. “I can’t.” Still, his voice comes out as a pained whisper. “You know I can’t.”

“...After everything?” Boredom says numbly and that’s just it. He’s numb inside and out at Sung’s denial. “Everything you’ve seen, everything you’ve learned?”

Sung stares at him, really stares at the defeated slump of his shoulders, the way his cape pools behind him like ink. Every night he had spent awake thinking about what he could have done differently, after every moment something would come back to him and it would be equal parts relief and grief at the recollection, after seeing Sung after Sung after Sung suffer just like he had.

But then there was everything that came after.

Every happy accident, every new friend met and every challenge faced. Things he would have maybe never done if it wasn’t for _this_. He wouldn’t have made Havve, he wouldn’t have met Phobos and Meouch, and what about Danny and Brian? And every other iteration of themselves- what about them? Maybe it wasn’t ever meant to be but it had still happened and Sung was better because of it.

And that’s why he couldn’t say yes no matter how much he wanted to.

No matter how much he should.

“I don’t know why this happened, but I can say this… we can’t… we can’t go back and change this despite how much it hurts, despite how much we want to.” Gods, think of the paradoxical anomalies, the alternate realities that could and would spawn from it. Boredom doesn’t even look at him but he continues on, thinking of just that. “But we can do something else. Maybe… maybe something even better.” He keeps his voice low and soft, as if to not startle Boredom. “New universes are constantly being created, that’s pocket universe theory in action right? So what’s stopping us from maybe…” Sung draws in a breath and moves oh so closer. “Helping them instead?”

“Do you really think that’s possible?” Boredom’s eyes are still trained on the ground but there’s something unfurling inside of him, something green and new and wanting.

Something like hope.

Real, genuine hope.

He kneels across from Boredom, clapping his hands down on the other’s pauldrons, offering the other the best smile he can manage. “It’s worth a try, isn’t it?”

Oh how self absorbed he had been, so obsessed with his own past and influencing others like him, rallying them to his side, that he hadn’t even thought of _that_ in the thick of his mania. The realization hurts but it’s necessary. A soft noise escapes Boredom and suddenly he’s folding in on himself, a soft cry leaving him. “How could I be so blind?”

His head whips up because he can’t help it at that point. Between the exhaustion and the emotional overload Sung can’t _help_ but laugh at the terrible joke the other manages to just accidentally make. “Oh d-don’t…” Boredom tries to chastise him but it’s too late, his own choked laugh escaping him

“I’m sorry! That’s so bad!” Boredom’s shoulders are shaking too and suddenly the other male is hiccuping with laughter as well. “Fuck! I’m sorry!”

For a moment it’s just that, the two of them laughing into their cupped hands, knowing full well it wasn’t the time to do as such and yet completely unable to help themselves. Suddenly Boredom’s laughter tapers off and he looks right at Sung with a haunted look, the reality finally seeming to setting in.

“No I- I’m… I’m sorry. I… I hurt so many people, I manipulated… I was the one… the one who gave Badness the means…” He trails off and covers his face. “I can’t be the one to do this. I’ve… I’m not you, Sung. I’m not like any of you.”

“Gods yes you are. We would do it too, don’t you doubt that for a second.” He drags Boredom forward then, doing his best to infuse the hug with as much support and love as he can manage. “I would give anything to have them back, to have it all back, but it’s in the past and all I can do now… all _we_ can do now… is move forward.” He pats the other’s flushed cheeks then, wiping at the tears there. “Now c’mon. No more of this. Moving forward.”

“Moving forward.” Boredom says in a hoarse voice and just like that they’re in the dead ‘verse, the sudden apparition of it startling both of them, causing them to pull apart in confusion.

_I couldn’t have put it better myself._

His head whips up and he really can’t believe his own eye because there’s Havve, hands on hips, face plate cocked towards them, a knowing look on his face despite the clear lack of expression. _Oh Sung, don’t…_ The robot starts.

And that’s when Sung starts to cry.

“...Is this… is this normal?” Boredom says after the first heaving sob leave him, incredulous at his sudden ugly crying session that’s apparently now taking place. “I-I’m slightly concerned...”

“I TOLD HIM! I TOLD HIM WE HAD TO COME BACK!” Sung manages another wet and gasping inhale. “THAT ASSHOLE! HE’S SUCH A-A-A JE-HER-HERKKKK!”

 _Sung…_ Havve’s covering his faceplate in embarrassment. _Stop, stop that right now. You’re a full grown adult..._

“THIS HAS BEEN A LONG DAY AND I DIDN’T KNOW IF YOU WERE DEAD!”

“If it makes you feel any better, the moment you touched down in this ‘verse is when I knew the plan was in motion, so you would have come back and I would have captured you…” Boredom adds, trying to be helpful, but that only makes it worse of course.

“I WOULD… HAVE KICKED YOUR ASS…!” Sung manages in a wrecked voice, rubbing at his eye helplessly. “E-EVERYONE’S ASS WOULD HAVE BEEN KICKED…”

 _And then you wouldn’t have come to the answers that you now have, would you Sung?_ Havve pins him with an unyielding red stare until he can’t help but snuffle loudly and look away in embarrassment. _Sung..._

“...I guess…”

“Should we go back?” Boredom’s pipes up again and Sung’s standing up with an eager nod, hoping it doesn’t look too obvious that he had been crying. The last thing he needed was for someone (cough _Meouch_ cough) to notice.

“Y-yes! Back to our friends!” He manages in a croaking voice, clearing it with an embarrassed sound. “A-And then…”

 _And then?_ Havve prompts.

He looks over then to see Boredom’s gaze, slightly unfocused. The way that he angles his pointed ears towards the conversation and the way he holds himself with a nervous stillness. The hope was slowly being buried under a fear that he would fail, that he would be unable to change...

Gods, Sung would be damned if he was the one to let the other down after everything they had been through.

After _all_ of this.

The empath goes over to the other and offers him his hand, letting it hang there until Boredom finally notes it and takes it with just a hint of nerves. “And then we have work to do.” He says and Boredom goes joyous with the announcement. “But first, friends! And also… explanation, I suppose.”

 _Oh, that’s going to be fun._ Havve says as he glances towards Boredom, optics going half dark at the top as his tone goes dry. _But maybe it’s also one to save for everyone else._

“Ugh, fine.” He stands and goes over to Boredom. “Alright, so let’s see here, just gonna grab the Device and… wait. Havve! Did you know you have a Device in you!? Better than this piece of junk!” Sung waves his around. “Let’s use yours.”

_Well I did have one._

“DID!?”

“That uh… that was my fault.” Boredom says in that small voice once more. “See, I went and put it into my Havve, so that we could travel… B-because you had my Device…”

“...Are you serious!?” Sung nearly chucks the Device at his counterpart but Havve catches his wrist just in time, shaking his head in silent judgement. “Gods damn it, fine, we’ll use this thing. Just _don’t_ be surprised if we show up in a place called LA.”

“LA?” Boredom says, head quirking in confusion.

“Terrible city, wonderful people, so not the point!” He unlocks Boredom’s Device and closes his eye. “Please oh please oh _PUH-LEASE_!” Sung shouts, raising it above his head. “TAKE US TO OUR FRIENDS!”

 _Really, with the dramatics, Sung?_ He hears Havve sigh over their link. _Never mind, I’ll stay here, the break was nice_.

“Oh, fuck o-”

And there’s no time to finish because Boredom’s laughing and they’re _gone_.

-

Once again, everyone is fighting.

Because that’s the norm, apparently.

Phobos stares at them all but at least this time it’s coming from a good place, even if they can’t seem to agree. They had all sat around the Lady World ‘verse for a whole thirty minutes before Meouch had stood up and demanded that they go because he’d be DAMNED if he missed out on the action.

Read: he was worried.

The other Meouch took to it too, acting all gruff, but the other Havve was more than happy to point out the fact that he was nervous and worried too, so at _that_ point it was more than easy for Phobos to suggest that they should all go, that it was the right thing to do, and that Sung would definitely do it for them, after all.

That helped them both calm down.

It was the fact that the girls wanted to join as well that surprised them all.

“Why not? Seeing a new universe would be fun. Why are you the only assholes that get to do it?” The female Sung said with a pointed glance.

“Yeah, that’s sexist.” The female Meouch huffed, causing both of her male counterparts to groan in response. “OH ARE WE GONNA FIGHT ABOUT THIS? BECAUSE LET’S GO, I’M READY! I’M NOT ABOUT TO LET TWO MEN TELL ME WHAT’S SEXIST AND WHAT’S _NOT_!”

“No fighting.” Phobos said in a helplessly quiet and wrecked voice. He couldn’t help it. He was tired, he was worn out, and he was gods damned worried about one of his best friend. “Plea-”

Suddenly, Havve stood up and clapped his bare hands together, the loud noise causing everyone to whip around in their direction.

“Phobos was speaking.” He said calmly before sitting down once more.

“...Um, t-thanks.” Phobos flushed before turning back to the full group. “No more fighting, w-we agree from here on out.”

“Pinky is right!” The female Sung wrapped her arm around his shoulder then, smiling brightly. “No fighting, we’re in this together! Now Pho, will you do us the honors?”

His female counterpart proceeded to bring out their Device, going orange and yellow with delight as she unlocked it. She inclined her head towards him and he stepped forward, taking it oh-so-carefully. “To Sung.” He whispered.

And then they were where they needed to be except _not_.

It’s a strange and echoing room that’s lined with circuits and holds the shining Sung in a chair in the middle of it all. And it’s not just him.

No it’s everyone they met on their travels and more.

The succulent Phobos is with his Sung and the Sung and Meouch from the jungle ‘verse have a Phobos and Havve with them as well, and not to mention the fact that his purple equivalent is here too, decorated in several bleeding slashes but alive all the same. He perks when he sees them, moving to stand but swaying on his feet, barely caught in time by the other Meouch from this ‘verse.

“What’s everyone doing here?” The other Havve says after a moment.

“We got worried.” The dark skinned Phobos says. “Talk about an evil Sung and Havve, the fact that there were two groups of us out there looking for their friends… It was worth investigating.”

“And where’s Sung?” Phobos says after a moment. “And Boredom?”

“...I don’t know…” The purple Phobos says after a moment, causing a spike of fear to run through the Lepid.

“We were just figuring out our next course of action-” The Sung from the succulent Phobos’s verse says but purple Phobos is cutting him off.

“We need to wake Sung up, I keep telling you that. He could know where Boredom is hiding-”

And they’re all yelling and the ladies are getting involved now too and Phobos is the only one who notices when the other Havve walks up to the sleeping Sung, simply touching the top of the chair with one hand while the other touches his core.

And the room fills with light just like that. Not the light of the Device either, tinged with blue and holding a crackling energy about this, no, this is a pure white that washes the entire room.

A chorus of swears are issued in reply and Phobos is almost certain he won’t ever be able to see again but the light is dying away and other Havve and Sung are in the middle of it all, Havve’s red eyes boring into Sung’s crystalline eyes that oh so slowly begin to open.

“...Oh, that was a nice nap…” He says after a moment. “...What did I miss?”

“Wow…” The female Meouch is the first one to speak and break the silence. “That’s… the most Sung thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life.”

“Hey! I take offense to that!” The shining Sung says sharply. “Listen, the last thing I remember is… you! You were being attacked!” There’s a finger being pointed at him and all eyes shift in his direction. “And I came to help and…” His brows crease over his strange eyes then as he tries to draw on the memory. “I… I don’t know what happened after that.”

“You were taken…” Phobos starts and that’s when it happens.

A flash of light, less impressive than the last one, and Sung shows up with Boredom and Havve in tow.

For a moment everyone stares at the strange group. It’s mostly everyone staring at Boredom, Phobos is sure of it, but no one says anything nor do they do anything for a whole fifteen seconds.

And then the purple Phobos is charging forward with a warrior’s cry, the last bit of his hair falling loose from it’s tie, streaming behind him like a banner-

Only to crash and burn half way through, falling straight onto his face.

“...I’m sorry… what’s happening?” Boredom says, looking both ways blindly. Sung’s got his mouth pressed into the thinnest line it can be, face turning an awful shade of red as he does his best not to burst out laughing at the scene. “There was yelling, and then a terrible sound, like someone fell.”

Sung’s falling then too, clutching his middle as he collapses with a laugh. “...I’m assuming it’s something funny.” Boredom says slowly, tone still colored with confusion, and Phobos is sure he’s not the only one watching the scene in confusion.

“Okay, okay, holy shit, can someone please explain what in the hell is going on here!” Meouch finally yells and Phobos is so gods damned grateful for it. “Because that one was asleep until literally two minutes ago, we still don’t know where the evil Havve went, for some reason our Havve is back now and you’re buddy buddy with our Sung, supposedly. My money is on brainwashing but we’re not there yet and I’m getting off topic and I’m very stressed and DOES SOMEONE HAVE A CIGARETTE, MY GODS.”

His female counterpart is holding one out to him and he’s taking it quickly, shoving it between his muzzle and puffing anxiously. “I thought you said you stopped smoking years ago!” Female Sung dismays.

“This is not the time to be talking about my guilty habits. Now’s the time to talk about, oh I don’t know, important things?”

“YOUR HEALTH IS IMPORTANT, MEOUCH!”

“This is literally hell.” The Havve from this universe says from behind his mask. “Are you happy you started this, Sung?” The shining Sung makes a face before he points to their Havve.

“Not me, him! He started it!”

“No, _I_ started it.” Boredom finally says in a clear and ringing voice, causing them all to shut up. Even Sung’s laughter finally dies and the purple Phobos from this universe is looking up at him from behind the curtain of hair that covers his face. “...And despite the chaos that it has created, _could_ have created, I’m just glad something good came of it- that it will continue to become of it.”

And in that glowing cave, with so many versions of himself and his friends, they all learn the story of Doc Boredom. A story of potentialities and actualities, of downfall and redemption, of hope and wanting and desperation.

He tells a story unlike any that’s been told before.

-

 

Sometime later he’s sitting at the mouth of the cave with Havve, his voice hushed as he recalls the way the stars had spoken to him, had heard his plea and had granted his wish in those desperate moments. “I don’t know what it means…” He says in a soft voice and the robot sighs across their link.

_Means no break, Sung._

He thinks of the Device inside of his friend, what that meant for him, for them as a group...

Still your Havve, Sung. Still the same Havve, no matter what.

 _Well, wouldn’t want the boredom to catch up to us, anyways._ Havve’s laughing at that, bumping his shoulder against his, and it's so easy to put that little fact on the back burner for now. It could wait, besides- they had more important things to take of first.

“You think we’re going to have to check up on him?” Sung says in a much quieter voice, casting a pointed glance back in the cavern where everyone else is.

_Of course. But I think he’s going to do well. He wants it, you can see it, sense it, right?_

Yes, of course, even from here. “...I’m going to go to the first one with him once everything settles down. He’s bringing his Havve along…” A pause and he looks at Havve cautiously. “Do you want to come with?”

 _Do you want me to?_ Havve cocks his head with a creak. It's said so matter of factly but something in the robot burns to have the same adventures they had been having without him this entire time. Sung grins with it.

“Well, duh!” He shoves at his friend’s shoulder under his spiked pauldron. “Want _all_ of you to come, but it’s… it’s kind of personal. You get it, right?” Havve nods and just like that a comfortable silence falls over them. _So much has changed and it happened so fast..._

_You're telling me._

“Hey, what are you two doing over there?” Suddenly there’s someone squirreling between them and it’s the shining Sung, his gap toothed smile unavoidable. “I still can’t believe I just ended up sleeping through this whole thing!”

“Your loss!” Sung snorts and his counterpart is giving a frustrated sigh.

“You owe me one space time adventure dude!” The other is saying and Sung’s groaning in response.

“First Boredom now you, who’s next?” He gives a fake grumble of annoyance before the realization hits. “Oh! Danny! Fuck!” Danny. He had promised Danny a space adventure, hadn’t he?

“Danny…?” Havve’s tilting his head and so is the other version of himself and Sung can’t help but smile at that, a wide and beaming thing that feels like it’s going to break his face in half before he stands.

_Sung, what are you…?_

Sure, maybe Havve was right, maybe there wasn’t any breaks, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t have a little fun in between, right?

Besides, after all this, they earned it.

“HEY!” He cups his hands around his mouth, calling down the cave. “WHO WANTS TO GO TO LA!?”

 _...What the hell is an LA?_ Havve stares up at him helplessly and Sung’s tipping his head back with a wild and easy laugh.

“It’s an adventure waiting to happen.” And based off the swell of interest that hits him from the back of the cave, from the way the stars seem to laugh and twinkle above head, he can’t help but think it’ll be a good one too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my goodness gracious was last night a treat  
> doctor sung  
> kissed my hand  
> holy shit you guys  
> BUT THAT'S NOT THE POINT (I JUST WANTED TO SHARE) the real point of this post is to say THANK YOU FOR READING THIS and that honestly, I've never had so much fun writing up a story. I'm thinking I'll return to Boredom because he has a lot of potential and there's a lot of stories to be told, but coming up with all of this on the fly was pretty cool cos I got to see what the fuck I could do as an author on such a short schedule.
> 
> Until next time y'all <3

**Author's Note:**

> Once upon a time Natalie sat herself down after she had been approved for the TWRP big bang and said "what the fuck are you going to write, you dumb bitch?"
> 
> Well, the answer came slowly but surely, carved itself out once I figured that it may very well be interesting to write a fanfiction where we met other versions of what fans had come up for for facecanons and lore and all of that good stuff. Multiverse theory is something I've always been interested in. It's even touched on in Swift like Mercury and inside of Between Two Mysteries as well because why wouldn't there be something else out there where things played out just a little differently? Like, it has to exist, right?
> 
> So that's what this story is about. I could have really dug into it but I limited myself to 50k. Maybe one day I'll return to this, but for now just know it's going to be a great story. 
> 
> I'll start to also credit accordingly once the second chapter is posted. Don't wanna give anything away ;-D


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